Chapter 6: Editing Records
The Record Editor is very similar to the Record Adder, but allows Adders to make changes to existing records.
Before a record can be edited, it must be found in the database. On the Adders' Homepage, the "Record # Search" box at the top left of the screen, offers access to records. Also, the Adding and Editing Records section lists two options for finding records to edit: Search the live database and Search the pending database.
Editing a record whose number is known
On the Adders' Homepage, the "Record # Search" box at the top left of the screen can be used to quickly edit a record whose record_id number is know. For example, if we want to edit the Cities/Building Archives, and we know it is record 10000, we can enter this number in the box, then press the Go button.
The subsequent screen will show the details of the record, along with a series of buttons representing actions that can be taken on the record. Click the Edit button (i.e. the pencil button) to load the record in the record editor.
Figure 6.3 shows record 10000 in the Record Editor. The interface is very similar to that of the Record Adder described in Chapter 4: Adding records (in fact the two are the same program internally). The Record Editor interface differs in several respects: the fields of the form are initialized with data values from the record, the buttons at the top of the screen are slightly different, and the record number appears next to the the web page title, as shown in Figure 6.1
Figure 6.1: The Record Editor.
As in the Record Adder, the adder should fill in the data fields in accordance with their judgement and the editorial guidelines of their institution. When the record is complete, the Adder clicks the preview button.
Searching for a record
The Search the live database option provides access to several tools for finding resources in the live database, which can then be loaded into the Record Editor. In each case, when the search is complete, the search results will be listed with a series of buttons. Any record can be loaded into the record editor by clicking on the Edit button.