The Sequences Management Page

Purpose

This screen is used to list, create, view, update and delete Sequence records. "Sequences" are a way to group Events together in order to tell a larger story. For instance, if you are investigating a war, you might create individual Events for battles, treaties and meetings. But then, you could use a sequence for the entire war, and include all these individual events in it. It makes it easier to access them as a group, and to navigate between them.

Please note that contrary to most other object management screens, the list and edition features have been implemented in the same screen in this case.

Getting There...

The Sequences management screen is not available straight from the Main Application Menu. To reach it:

From the Main Application Menu (or indeed almost any other Project Hirtius page), click on the "Manage Events" icon in the header ().
Scroll to the bottom of the page. Click on the Sequences link located between the Events List and the page footer. This gets you to the Sequences Management Page.

Supported actions

The Sequences Management Page supports the following actions:

List: displays a table listing all existing Sequence records. This is the default mode when you first reach the page.
Add: the form to fill in and submit in order to create a new Sequence record.
Insert: creating the new Sequence record in the database (post Add action).
Edit: modifying an existing Sequence record through a form populated based on the current database contents.
Update: storing the modified data in the database, updating the appropriate Sequence record (post Edit action).
View: display the current database contents for the selected Sequence 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 from the database (post DelCon action). Even Sequences that still contain Event records can be deleted -- the linked events remain untouched.
That action will be recorded: a new entry will be added to the Event Log.

Of these, only List and View are entry points. The former is typically reached from the Events List, while the latter can be reached from search result pages, for instance, or using the "quick jump" feature (Go button) or object refs in comments (e.g. '{C6}').

Fields

Here below are the fields that you can expect to find on the Sequence 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 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).

Object ID*	D	Sequential ID, automatically assigned by the DB during record creation. Displayed read-only once available.
Name*	D	Name (description) for the sequence. Make it short, but as explicit as possible.
	F	Free text.
	V	Has to be unique.
Comment	D	Any comment you might have on the sequence itself (the reason it makes sense to you), or its subject (the larger historical context it is meant to cover, etc). You could be tempted to store here the parts of your research that don't naturally fit in any of the linked events. If you do so, please keep in mind that Sequences are only "lesser objects", and as such can't be linked to Projects. So, if your current research is carried out within the context of a project (or might be in the future), it may be wiser to store these bits of information in Tiddlers rather than here (see Projects Management Workflow for more information on this topic).
Comment	F	Free text. HTML markup allowed. Special formats: '`{D1234}`': quote another Hirtius object using its object prefix and ID. Automatically rendered as a link to that object view page. See Objects and Metadata Types for a list of all prefixes supported by the application. Only objects and lesser objects can be referred to in this way. '`[1234]`': Bibref. Refers to the bibliographical reference with said number, as defined further down the page in the *References* section. Rendered as a link to a named anchor. Only works with bibrefs attached to the current object. '`[S1234]`': Srcref. Refers to the source reference with said number, as defined further down the page in the *Sources* section. Rendered as a link to a named anchor. Only works with srcrefs attached to the current object. Insert these formats in your text without the enclosing quotes. If the object that you refer to doesn't exist (yet) or is not linked to the current object (in the case of Bibref and Srcref), the reference will be rendered in a special style (orange italics) and the associated link will point to that object creation page (where possible).

In addition to these, when in 'list' mode, some extra computed columns are displayed:

#:: The number of Event records that are currently linked to this Sequence.

Controls

In List mode

For each Sequence in the list, the first and last columns of its row contain links that correspond to actions to be performed on the Sequence object.

object ID: the object ID (left-most column) is a link that opens the Sequences Management Page in view mode for the selected Sequence.
Edit: opens the Sequences Management Page in edit mode for the selected Sequence.
Del: opens the Sequences Management Page in delete confirmation mode for the selected Sequence. You can then confirm to proceed with the deletion or cancel it and return to the list. If there are still Event records linked to the selected Sequence, the confirmation message says so, but this won't prevent you from deleting the sequence if you wish to do so. Linked events will remain unaffected. Any metadata attached to the sequence itself (bibrefs, sourcerefs, attachments) will be lost, of course).

In addition to this, a global action is available on the last row (bottom right corner) of the list:

Add: opens the Sequences Management Page in add mode (displays a blank HTML form to be filled in order to create a new Sequence record).

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).
Back to list link: Located at the bottom of the page, just above the footer. Click on this link to return to the list of defined Sequences.

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 action link next to the name in the list to return to the current Sequence 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).
New Event: Located in the bottom right corner of the linked Events list in the Events section, this will open the Events Edition Page in "Add" mode. Use it to create a new Event record, adding it to the current Sequence at the same time.
Please note that the Event-Sequence relationship can be managed from the Event side as well, through the Sequence Membership Management Page.
Link Events: Located in the bottom right corner of the linked Events list in the Events section, this will open the Event Selector in a new window. Use it to select existing Event records and add them to the current Sequence (one at a time at this stage).
Please note that the Event-Sequence relationship can be managed from the Event side as well, through the Sequence Membership Management Page.
Edit References: This will open the Object - Bib. Ref. Edition Page.
Edit Sources: This will open the Object - Source Ref. Edition Page.
Edit Attachments: This will open the Object - Attached File Edition Page.
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).
Back to list link: Located at the bottom of the page, just above the footer. Click on this link to return to the list of defined Sequences.