Schema and Parameter Sets

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

Managing Schema

Schema are managed through the Django administrative interface. The administrative interface is normally accesible from a link similar to:

http://domain.com:8000/admin/

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

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

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.