fix(workflows): gate validate() must not crash on non-string options (#3233)

GateStep.validate() reports non-string options as an error, but then -- when on_reject is 'abort'/'retry' -- still runs the reject-choice check 'any(o.lower() in ... for o in options)'. For a non-string option (e.g. options: [123]) o.lower() raised AttributeError, which escaped validate() and broke validate_workflow's documented 'return a list of errors, never raise' contract. Guard the check so it only runs when every option is a string (the non-string case is already reported above).

Co-authored-by: Claude Opus 4.8 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

src/specify_cli/workflows/steps/gate/__init__.py

@@ -194,7 +194,14 @@ class GateStep(StepBase):
                 f"Gate step {config.get('id', '?')!r}: 'on_reject' must be "
                 f"'abort', 'skip', or 'retry'."
             )
-        if on_reject in ("abort", "retry") and isinstance(options, list):
+        # Only inspect option text when every option is a string; otherwise the
+        # `o.lower()` below would raise AttributeError on a non-string option
+        # (already reported above) and break validate_workflow's never-raise contract.
+        if (
+            on_reject in ("abort", "retry")
+            and isinstance(options, list)
+            and all(isinstance(o, str) for o in options)
+        ):
             reject_choices = {"reject", "abort"}
             if not any(o.lower() in reject_choices for o in options):
                 errors.append(

tests/test_workflows.py

@@ -1455,6 +1455,23 @@ class TestGateStep:
         })
         assert any("on_reject" in e for e in errors)
 
+    def test_validate_non_string_options_does_not_raise(self):
+        """Non-string options with on_reject=abort/retry must be REPORTED as an
+        error, not crash: the reject-choice check calls o.lower() on each option,
+        which previously raised AttributeError on a non-string option and broke
+        validate_workflow's 'return errors, never raise' contract."""
+        from specify_cli.workflows.steps.gate import GateStep
+
+        step = GateStep()
+        # on_reject defaults to "abort", which triggers the option-text check.
+        errors = step.validate({"id": "test", "message": "Review", "options": [123]})
+        assert any("must be strings" in e for e in errors)
+        # also with an explicit retry on_reject
+        errors = step.validate(
+            {"id": "test", "message": "Review", "options": [True], "on_reject": "retry"}
+        )
+        assert any("must be strings" in e for e in errors)
+
     def test_interactive_prompt_renders_show_file(self, tmp_path, monkeypatch, capsys):
         from specify_cli.workflows.steps.gate import GateStep
         from specify_cli.workflows.base import StepContext, StepStatus