Schema and Parameter Sets

MyTARDIS stores metadata as Parameters, which are grouped in to Parameter Sets, which are defined by a Schema.

Managing Schema

MyTARDIS administration, including Schema management, is based on the in-build Django administrative interface. The administrative interface is accesible from a link similar to:

http://localhost:8000/admin/

Schema definitions are the combination of two tables, Schema and ParameterName.

Selecting “Schemas” in the adminstrative interface will display a list of the installed schemas, clicking on a schema displays the editor for that schema.

The Schema fields are:

Namespace

The namespace uniquely identifies the schema. When exporting an experiment as a METS file the namespace is used as an XML Namespace, and thus must follow the XML standard, i.e. in the form of a URL.

The MyTARDIS naming convention is:

http://domain.com/localidentifiers/schemaname/version

Name

The display name of the schema.

Type

Experiment, Dataset or Datafile

Subtype

Used to group and identify schema for forms based searching

The ParameterName fields are:

Schema

The namespace of the schema which this parameter belongs to.

Name

The identifier used to ingest parameters

Full Name

The display name of the parameter

Units

The display name of the units for numerical values

Data Type

One of:

• Numeric
• String
• Longstring
• URL
• Filename
• Datetime
• Link

Strings use the input field widget for editing, while longstrings use a textarea widget.

Immutable

If true, no user editing of the parameter is allowed, regardless of access.

Comparison Type

The type of search to be performed with Forms Based Search. Not used by Advanced Search.

Is Searchable

Flag whether this parameter is searchable.

Choices

If defined, a drop down list of values is displayed.

Order

The display order of the parameters within the schema. Sorting is by Order, then alphabetically.