The Libraries Edition Page

Purpose

This screen is used to create, view, update and delete Library records. In the context of Project Hirtius, "libraries" are used to populate a drop-down select control on the Book and Source objects edition screens. These fields keep track of where that book or source may be available.

Library records have further metadata, as you may need a library card to gain access to their facilities. Project Hirtius offers you a full-featured management interface for those library cards, including the sending of reminders to the user when the card expires and needs to be renewed. See the Library Cards Edition Page for more information on this topic.

Getting There...

The Libraries Edition Page is not available straight from the Main Application Menu. To reach the Edition Page of an existing Library:

From the Main Application Menu (or indeed almost any other Project Hirtius page), click on the "Manage Sources" () or "Manage Books" () icon in the header.
Scroll to the bottom of the page. Click on the Libraries link located between the Sources List or Books and Articles List and the page footer. This gets you to the Libraries List.
Navigate the Libraries List until you locate the library that you're looking for.
Then click on the library ID (first column). This gets you to the Libraries Edition Page in 'view' mode.

Supported actions

The Library Edition Page supports the following actions:

Add: the form to fill in and submit in order to create a new Library record.
Insert: creating the new Library record in the database (post Add action).
Edit: modifying an existing Library record through a form populated based on the current database contents.
Update: storing the modified data in the database, updating the appropriate Library record (post Edit action).
View: display the current database contents for the selected Library record. No form in this case.
DelCon: first step when requesting the deletion of a record -- issues a prompt for confirmation.
Del: the actual removal of the selected record (as well as all linked metadata records) from the database (post DelCon action). Please note that you can't remove a Library record unless no Book or Source record references it. The delete confirmation message will make that clear.
That action will be recorded: a new entry will be added to the Event Log.

Of these, only Add, Edit, View and DelCon are entry points. They are typically reached from the Libraries List.

Fields

Here below are the fields that you can expect to find on the Library Edition Page. The goal here is not to simply duplicate the database layout information. If this is what interests you, please refer to the Database Layout, the database creation script or the database itself. The purpose is rather to explain what each field is meant for [D], what format it is expected to follow [F] and what are the conditions for its validity (if applicable) [V].

A star (*) after the name of the field denotes a mandatory field (the star is shown in red with the same meaning in the application user interface).

Library ID*	D	Sequential ID, automatically assigned by the DB during record creation. Displayed read-only once available.
Library name*	D	Library name.
Library name*	F	Free text.
Street address	D	Street address.
Street address	F	Free text.
City	D	City.
City	F	Free text.
ZIP	D	Postal code (ZIP). The field is text and max. 20 char. long, so for addresses in the U.S. it can contain both the ZIP code and State 2-letter code.
ZIP	F	Free text (max. 20 char. long).
Country	D	Country. Select from drop-down.
Website	D	If the library has a web site, specify its URL here.
Website	F	URL.
Catalogue	D	If the library's catalogue is available on-line, specify its URL here.
Catalogue	F	URL.
Comment	D	Any comment you might have on the library itself, such as its opening hours.
Comment	F	Free text. HTML markup allowed.

Controls

In View mode

Website and Catalogue link(s): Clicking on the word Open next to Website or Catalogue leads to the specified pages. If unset, these fields are not displayed.
Books link(s): The Books section offers direct links to all Book records that reference the current library. These links will open the Books Edition Page in 'view' mode.
Sources link(s): The Sources section offers direct links to all Source records that reference the current library. These links will open the Sources Edition Page in 'view' mode.
Switch to edit mode link: Located at the bottom of the page, just above the footer. Click on this link to edit the current object (switches the view from a R/O rendering of the contents to an HTML form that allows you to modify that contents and submit it afterward).

In Edit mode

Submit button: (Also in "Add" mode). Commits the locally modified HTML form fields contents to the database that stores Project Hirtius data. Use it to save your latest modifications. It is of course perfectly legitimate to click Submit any number of times during a long edition session to avoid loosing unsaved data. When doing so, use the Edit this library some more... link on the update result screen (see below) to return to the current library record and edit it further.
Reset button: (Also in "Add" mode). Cancels any un-committed change, and returns all HTML form fields to their initial value (i.e. the one they had when the page was last loaded in the browser). Use this button to revert any erroneous edit you might have done (Beware: this only works on local changes that have not been saved to the database yet, i.e. for which you've not clicked on Submit yet).
Books link(s): The Books section offers direct links to all Book records that reference the current library. These links will open the Books Edition Page in 'view' mode.
Sources link(s): The Sources section offers direct links to all Source records that reference the current library. These links will open the Sources Edition Page in 'view' mode.
Switch to view mode link: Located at the bottom of the page, just above the footer. Click on this link to view the current object (switches from the current HTML form that allows you to modify the object contents and submit it afterward to a R/O rendering of that contents).

In Insert or Update result mode

This result page appears once you have clicked the Submit button on the Add or Edit page. It will offer the following links:

Edit this library some more... link: Returns you to the current >Library record in edit mode. Use this link to further edit the library in question. This link is also present just after you added a new library.
Add new library link: Opens the form that allows you to create a new Library record. Usefull when creating multiple records in sequence.
Library list link: Returns you to the Libraries List.