Applications

When we speak of a Collections application, we mean the application that you see in your browser window when log into Axiell Collections. These applications include the application for Library, Museum, Archive or combinations thereof.

The functionality of the standard Collections user interface is described in the Collections online Help. The structure of these Collections applications (its databases, fields, screens etc.) can be created and/or edited in Axiell Designer.

The components of a Collections application

Collections applications are actually a symbiosis of a number of very different files, distinguished most notably by on the one hand a files collection of information about the interface structure of your application (mainly in the .pbk, .inf and .fmt files), and on the other hand the core software files that use this information to run the application and display it in the browser. The core software offers all the functionality, like printing, searching and editing, while the interface structure specifies which databases, screens, methods and adapls and such will be used by that functionality.

The core software regularly gets new releases, which have to be installed manually by the application manager, offering you new functionality and fixed bugs in your existing applications. You cannot edit this core software in any way.
Your existing Collections applications remain as they are until you modify them yourself or until you commission us to do so.

Application and database definitions

Although everything you edit in the tools of Designer is considered part of a Collections application, we speak of the "application setup" when we mean to edit the application definition: this is the main interface file: it has the file extension .pbk. This file holds all settings for the interface and lots of references to other files (like databases, screen files and adapls) and objects in those files (like datasets and fields). These application definitions must be edited in the Application browser and can be found in folders with the name of the Collections applications.

Note that in the Application browser you can also edit the database (structure) definitions that are stored in .inf files, which are always located in your \data folder: this is called the "database setup".
Keep this distinction in mind when you edit an application, because database definitions and the databases themselves should be seen as completely separate from the application definition, and treated that way. This is because a database can be used by more than one application, and its structure should only be edited if e.g. you want to be able to save a new field in it, or need extra domains in an authority file like the thesaurus, or if you want to save a different type of value in an existing field. Most interface related stuff can be set in the application definition and in screen files and adapls, for which you never have to open the \data folder.

Screens and adapls

Screens and adapls are also separate files that are often used in more than one application. And thus, although screens are typically a part of the interface, you shouldn't edit a screen before knowing in which applications, and where, this screen is being used. (You can look for such references using the Object searcher in Designer.)