Diversity Collection
Transaction
Main sectors
The image below gives you an overview of the main sectors related to the transaction.
Prerequisites to use transactions
The transfer of a specimen between collections is handled with transactions. There are two prerequisites to use transactions in DiversityCollection. You are required to be in the user group CollectionManager (see UserAdministration) and the collections in which you have the right to handle transactions must have been assigned to you is shown in the CollectionManagers section.
Historical development
To create charts for the historical development see chapter Charts.
Visibility of transactions
A specimen may be involved in diverse transactions between collections
like loan, purchase, gift or exchange. The transactions are shown in the
tree for the parts of a specimen and symbolized with e.g. an
icon. For specimens which are still on loan
an 
icon is shown while a returned loan is
symbolized with an 
icon (see image below). A
data embargo will be symbolized with an
icon. If there are older accession numbers
linked to a specimen involved in a transaction, these numbers can be
documented together with the entry of the transaction of the respective
part of the specimen.
To customize the sequence and format of the transactions shown in the tree, choose Administration → Customize display ... from the menu and see the chapter customize for further details.
As an administrator you can edit and add entries to the Standard
comments for transactions click on the button
in the header.
For details see chapter customize.
If you are a CollectionManager, you may take a look at the details of a
transaction. Select the specimen part in the tree and click on the
button which will be shown in the details
next to the name of the transaction. This will open the window for the
transactions as described below.
To edit the transactions choose Administration - Transactions from
the menu. A window will open as shown below. In the tree at the top the
relations between the transactions are shown. To create a transaction
dependent on another transaction choose the superior transaction in the
tree and click on the 
button in the panel right of
the tree. With the 
button you may create a copy of
a transaction. To delete a specimen from the list click on the
button. To transfer all selected specimen in an
existing transaction choose Data → 
Transfer
→ To transaction... from the menu and
choose the transaction where the specimen with all their parts should be
included. In two following dialogs you may restrict the transferred
parts to a certain collection or material category. The data for the
transactions is stored in the tables
Transaction and
CollectionSpecimenTransaction.
The ID of the transaction is shown in the header. Behind the ID the
maintenance button may
appear in case of missing units in parts which e.g. for the creation of
sending letters may cause unexpected results. Click on the maintenance button to
open the maintenance for fixing this problem. With the 
feedback button you can
send a feedback to the software developer. To view the history of a data
set click on the
history button. A window
with the history will open. For more details see the section
History.
The settings
button will open the settings for the transaction. The
edit table button opens a table
editor for the selected transactions. For large
hierarchies the retrieval from the database may be time consuming. To
hide the hierarchy use the 
botton resp.
to show the hierarchy. The list for the
specimen may be shown 
or hidden
.
Data entry
On this page you may edit the data of a transaction. Every transaction
is linked to an administrating collection (symbolized by the key
) and can be edited exclusively by
CollectionManagers of this collection. To
appoint managers choose Administration - Managers from the
menu.
The transactions can be organized in a hierarchy as shown in the image
above, if e.g. you wish to keep together all loans to a certain
institution. To create a transaction of an inferior transaction choose
the superior transaction in the tree and click on the
button in the panel at the right side of the tree.
To create of copy of a transaction, use the button
and the button to delete it. If you want to
change the position within the hierarchy, select the transaction and
click on the 
button. A window will open where
you can select the new parent. Depending on the type of transaction you
have up to 3 dates, e.g. for a loan you have a begin date, an end date
and in case of a prolongation an end date of the prolongation.
There are the following types of transaction:
| Transaction type | Description |
|---|---|
| embargo |
Temporary data embargo for specimen that should not be published within the specified period |
 exchange |
the exchange of specimens between institutions |
 gift |
the gift of specimens to an institution |
 inventory |
the inventory of specimens within an institution |
| loan |
the loan of specimens of an institution to an external loan taker |
 permanent loan |
permanent loan of specimens of an institution to an external loan taker |
 permit |
permit or certificate for the collection of specimen |
 purchase |
the purchase of specimen by an institution |
 regulation |
a regulation concerning a specimen in a collection |
 removal |
a removal of a specimen from a collection |
 return |
a complete or partial return of a loan |
 transaction group |
an entry to organize your transactions |
The fields display in the Details tab will vary with the type of
the transaction as e.g. an embargo does not need any address
information. For the addresses use the links to the module
DiversityAgents as shown in the image above. You may optionally enter a
collection and the program will then use the corresponding address as
described below. As the recipient of e.g. a loan may not be entered in
DiversityAgents, you can enter the name of the person directly in the
To-address. The use of the collection as a reference in the From
and To section is deprecated. Please use a link to the module
DiversityAgents instead. If you need these controls please open the
settings and select the
Show all address fields
option.
Common notes
On the tab pages for generating documents you need to specify a
xml-schema for your document. Click on the 
button
to choose one of the predefined schemas or create your own. To edit the
schema files (*.xslt) you may use a text editor or software like e.g.
EditiX. If you do not specify a schema for
your form (i.e. the field for the path of the schema is empty - see
below), you will see the XML output created by the database as shown
below.
To choose a schema click on the button and select
a schema from the list. DiversityCollection contains several ready to
use schemas in the folder Transaction - Schemas - Sending.
Feel free to change these schemas according to your own needs (editors
are available e.g. from http://www.altova.com/). Choose the schema you
need and click on the 
button to
create a document. To print the document use the
printer button. To store the current document for
later reference in Documents click on the 
save button.
An example for a document is shown
below.
Sending list
The specimens will be listed with their accession number, an optional label of the part, the material category and if available the country and the collection year to ensure discrimination in case a specimen contains more than one part. If available a permit will be shown at the last position (see image below).
In the sending list - to see the details of a permit - click on the line containing the permit. The details will for the permit will be shown as in the example below.
Finding addresses
The addresses used for the documents are taken from the module DiversityAgents, where addresses are stored. Therefore the entries must at some point be linked to an entry in this module. The program will try to find an address as shown below: First the transaction partners (from ... and to ...) will be checked. If no address is available (e.g. if the transaction partner is not linked to an entry in DiversityAgents), the program will try to find an address in one of the superior transactions from the transaction partners found there. If no address exists in these transactions, the program will try to get an address from the collections. Therefore, a transaction partner linked to DiversityAgents is only necessary if either there are no addresses for the collections or you wish to use a different address. The search path as described is summarized in the image below.
No Access
If the data contain datasets, where you have no access to, this will be indicated as shown below.
The access to the data rely on the result of the view TransactionList, combining the transactions with missing administrating collection and those where the current user is a member of the group CollectionManager with allowance for the collection where the transaction is administrated. Transactions within a hierarchy to which the user has no access will be displayed with gray titles.