Events
By Sandra Schloen, October 2021
OCHRE Events are a powerful feature that provide options for your project to accomplish tasks like:
managing workflow
documenting life histories
tracking inventory
Events are simply Property Values listed in the Taxonomy contextualized within OCHRE's special-purpose "Events" Variable. Events can be assigned to any OCHRE item that has an Events tab (most do!).
Events are added in sequence -- that is, OCHRE manages Events as an ordered list, based on the order as listed by data entry.
Note to Project Administrators
The Events feature is activated by copying in the special-purpose "Events" Variable from the OCHRE master project.
You can copy in just the "Events" Variable and create your own list of custom event-values for the sole use of your project;
Or, you can copy in just the "Events" Variable and grey-copy selected event-values from the OCHRE master list;
Or, you can red-copy in the entire OCHRE master list and have a long list of ready-made options for your project's use. If ever new events are needed that would be of general interest, we are happy to add to our master list.
Elements of an Event
An Event consists of an action with optional links to a Location (a Spatial unit), an Agent (a Person item), or a Period. Such links are added in the usual way: double-click in the relevant table cell for the link-manager buttons or the chevron-picklist.
A free-form Comment can also be included.
Events are entered and edited manually using the toolbar provided, but they can also be applied via a Predefinition.
Event Date options
When an Event requires more flexible date options, click the "clock" button to expose additional columns for partial-date (e.g., year only) and date-range (e.g. start and end dates) data entry.
Private Events
Events can be marked as private by checking ON the Private? option. Private events will be suppressed in published or exported versions of the item. Private events might be used for internal communication among the project team; e.g. "To follow up" by ...
The Zincirli project uses Events to track workflow. These are displayed as part of an item's View.
The Lives, Individuality and Analysis (LIA) project documents life histories of, and relationships among, 19th-century scientists
Fulfillment Events
One Event can be designated as the fulfillment of another by linking it as the Event fulfillment value from the Taxonomy. Given the example shown, if an item has been assigned the Event "To photograph" and, later, also the event "Photographed" then the original event (To photograph) is considered to be fulfilled.
The Event "Photographed" is specified as the fulfillment of the Event "To photograph."
Querying Events
Events can be used for finding items via Queries, often compounded with other Query Criteria. To include Event criteria, check ON the checkbox on the Events tab. Event criteria may contain specifications pertaining to any of the Event elements. For example, find all items photographed by a specific person within a data range; or, find all items moved to a specific location; or, find all items whose Comment matches a given text-string.
Queries can consider Criteria pertaining to any of the Event details.
Fulfillment relationships can be taken into account by the Query. For example, the photographer can generate a list of accomplishments by restricting just to fulfilled events. The query result will include only those items that have the requested event (To photograph) and also, later in sequence, the fulfillment event (Photographed).
On the other hand, the photographer can generate a to-do list by restricting to unfulfilled events, those that were assigned the requested event (To photograph) but have not yet been assigned the fulfillment event (Photographed).
Adding Events en masse
Project administrators have tools available to apply Events to items en masse, based on a list of Query Results. Contact the OCHRE Data Service for assistance with this feature.