Overview

To retrieve and manage objects, files, batches, and events in DRS, you perform a search. You can use a quick search to retrieve content by an identifier (DRS ID, URN, owner supplied name). Or perform an advanced search on specific metadata values and combine search terms with boolean operators.

From search results, you can use Display facets to browse the administrative metadata values of what you retrieved. You can also download or upload the results set and perform bulk processing.

Web Admin enforces owner code restrictions on viewing content in DRS. Your search results will be limited to content under your owner code.

Quick Search by DRS ID, URN, or OSN

Use quick search to retrieve batches, files or objects by DRS ID, DRS object URN, DRS delivery URN, or owner supplied name. These identifiers are available in your DRS2 batch deposit report. 

To clear all search forms and results, click the Reset button (below the search form).

How to use quick search:

1. Use the Search for list to select batch, object, file, or event.
2. Enter the ID, URN, or owner supplied name in the text box on the right. Note that the wildcard * is not supported in a quick search.
3. Press Enter or click the Quick Search button to execute the search.

Quick search performs a query across all identifier types but limits results to the content selected in the Search for list (batch, object, file).

Example: quick search for object with DRS ID 400675606:



If you get confusing results, check your "Search for" selection and the identifier that you entered. Also, use the "Show/Hide Columns" link from the Actions dropdown list and expose one or more metadata columns that indicate a relationship (e.g. Has object with ID). This may help to explain the results you receive.

Here are two scenarios in which your quick search results may not seem to make sense.

• Mis-match between ID and "Search for" selection. If you accidentally specify "file" when quick searching for an object's DRS ID, you will retrieve all files associated with that object.
• Quick search query matching is loose. Quick search results will include identifiers that match or contain the query term. In most cases, if you search a complete identifier you will retrieve a single result, but if you search for a value that happens to be contained within another identifier, you may retrieve multiple hits.

Advanced Search

Use an advanced search when you need to search a specific metadata field or need to compose a more complex search that includes multiple terms combined with boolean operators.

How to use advanced search:

1. Select a content type (batch, object, file, or event) from the Search for list.
2. Select metadata to search. Click below Column Name and scroll the list of values that appears. Note: The list of metadata values will vary based on the content type selected in the Search for list.
3. For date or size searches, select the appropriate operator (Equals, > <).
4. Enter your search terms. Click below Value and type your search terms. Use a wildcard * to substitute for one or more characters. For date searches, a calendar picker will display. Click the Save button to continue.
5. [Optional] To find deleted content, include "status=deleted" (column=Status and Value=deleted) as a component in your search.
6. [Optional] To add another search term, click plus on the right side to add another search row and repeat steps 2-4. (To remove a search row, click minus.)
7. [Optional] To group your search into sub-queries, click in the parenthesis column on left and right as needed.
8. Click the Search button to execute the search. Results will display below the search form.

Example: Find batches by load date:



Example: Find objects by content model (CMID-4.0 is a PDS object):



Example: Find files by owner code, format and content model of object:



Example: Find objects by MODS metadata, using grouping and Boolean operators:

Faceted Browse

Faceted browse displays the administrative metadata values (facets) available in your current results set and lets you progressively refine the set based on these facets. Facets provide a quick way to see the administrative characteristics of your result set and can help narrow a list of objects or files in preparation for bulk processing.

To use faceted browse, perform a search and then choose Display facets from the Actions drop-down menu. A pop-up window displays containing facet values for the current results list. In parentheses next to each metadata value is the number of items in results with that value. To narrow results by facet value, click a value in the facet window and your current results list will be limited to items with that value. 

Facets are supported for these administrative fields:

Download/Upload of Results Sets

Use the Download search results option to save metadata in your result set for use outside of Web Admin. You might download a CSV file for easier review of metadata in a tool like Excel.

Use the CSV File Upload option to insert a result set for management in Web Admin. You might upload a custom result set in preparation for downloading content or bulk processing.

A CSV file is a text file containing comma-separated data that can be viewed in a text editor or spreadsheet application.

Downloading a search result set

Use the Download search results file option to generate a comma-delimited text file (a .csv file) of the current search result that you can save to a local drive. The CSV file captures the currently active results, including the column headers in use and a row of metadata for each item in the result set. Results in the file are based on the search only; results filtered out by using facets will still be included in a downloaded file. The search query that produced the results is not included.

How to download a result set:

1. Select the DownloadSearch results option from the Action dropdown menu.
2. The browser will prompt you to save the file search-results.csv to a local drive. Save it to a convenient location. You can change the file name as needed. If you plan to upload this search result later, keep the .csv file extension.

Uploading a results set

Use the CSV File Upload option to insert a result set into the Web Admin search results table. The uploaded set will replace any current results in the results table. Manually-created csv files will be accepted as long as they comply with these requirements:

• File must be plain text with a .csv extension. File name can be any alphanumeric string.
• File contents must follow format of the Download CSV file. A single CSV file can contain a maximum of 100,000 items.
• At minimum, a csv file must contain a column for DRS ID, owner supplied name, or URN.
• Column headings for included columns are required and must match DRS column headings (the easiest way to get the DRS column headings is to download a CSV of search results and copy the headings)

How to upload a csv file:

1. Click the CSV File Upload button. A pop-up window will display.
2. Under Load, select the content type (objects, files, batches, or events).
3. Under Using, select the identifier by which the content will be retrieved. Accept the default DRS IDs option if your csv file includes DRS IDs, otherwise select OSNs or URNs as appropriate.
4. Click the Upload button and the uploaded results will be inserted into the results table.

NOTE: WebAdmin is not able to download the search results from an uploaded CSV.

Bulk Processing

Web Admin supports bulk processing – the ability to make changes to a group of objects or files and the associated metadata. In this release, you can perform bulk download and bulk deletion/recovery of content in search results, as well as limited bulk metadata editing (file access flags and object DRS Billing Codes). 

Note that bulk processing a large set of objects or files can generate a high volume of background transactions – especially descriptor updates and indexing changes. These transactions will take time to complete. There may be extra delay before your changes are visible in search results or individual object and file metadata summaries. 

For more information, see these topics later in this Guide:

Bulk download of content 
Bulk delete and recovery of content
Bulk editing of metadata