I was chatting with @diana today and we were talking about the possible need to start with an empty CHT Instance, maybe via the Docker Helper, and then continually create a bunch of recent data in it.
Does anyone have such a need? I’ve preemptively created a ticket for an “easy mode” for test data generator, but I’d love any input (including from you Diana 
) Maybe one of the OG TDG devs @jkuester has some thoughts too?
cheers!
Hi @mrjones
Thanks for your question! I think the test data generator is a good choice for creating sample data. I think having a “default” design that will create a hierarchy and users that have tasks and display some of the default config workflows would be ideal for people who want a look-and-feel initial experience with the CHT.
I noted this on the TDG ticket, but the idea for the included default sample design was that it could provided a kind of base set of sample data for the default config in cht-core. No one has gotten around to fully building it out yet, though.
This is also something I have been considering adding support for in CHToolbox: Consider adding support for defalut data sets that can be "generated" into an instance · Issue #71 · jkuester/chtoolbox · GitHub
@mrjones thank you for bringing this up. My crazy dream version of this would be a tool (maybe even a cht-conf command) that can generate test data based on the actual config. That way, each project could generate realistic test data tailored to their config, instead of relying on something tied to the default config, which rarely reflects real-world use cases. This would also make it much easier to support testing workflows, demos, and onboarding.
Happy to help brainstorm how this could work or test anything out!