I have also tried with type hints and it still broadcasts to string. Very weird...

Type hints are ignored, it's the actual value you pass that is important:
` @PipelineDecorator.component(return_values=['data_frame'], cache=True, task_type=TaskTypes.data_processing)
def step_one(pickle_data_url: str, extra: int = 43):
...

@PipelineDecorator.pipeline(name='custom pipeline logic', project='examples', version='0.0.5')
def executing_pipeline(pickle_url, mock_parameter='mock'):
data_frame = step_one(pickle_url, extra=1337) implies extra ` is an integer Because this is the value that was passed by the pipeline controller when calling the function
make sense ?