Updating Browse Pages
Introduction
At the beginning of each month, after the previous month's new and updated EADs have been added to Arclight, the Bentley's finding aid browse (public link) portion of the Bentley Historical Library's website will need to be updated by the Lead Archivist for Collections Management. This is accomplished using the Bentley's browse pages ArchivesSpace plugin (public link), which adds an "Update Browse Pages" background job to ArchivesSpace.
This portion of the website consists of several sub-pages:
Numerous browsable pages (e.g., the A-B page (public link) that lists, in alphabetical order by surname or corporate name, those resources that do not exclusively have a UA classification (e.g., a MHC, or UA and FAC, etc.).
A University of Michigan page (public link) that lists, in alphabetical order by surname or corporate name, resources that exclusively have a University Archives (UA) classification.
A New and Updated page (public link) for newly published and recently updated resources.
How it Works
The plugin uses the following fields from a resource record to list an ArchivesSpace resource on the finding aids browse page:
Publish: Only published resources will be listed on the page. This is why new collections that 1.) are currently being described and 2.) have never been exported as an EAD file must be unpublished. Collections that have a publicly available EAD online should remain published, even if they're being updated. Otherwise, these finding aids will be removed from the finding aids browse pages.
Classification: Depending on their classification(s), resources will appear on different pages. Those resources that only have a University Archives classification will be added to the University of Michigan page (public link). All other resources will be listed on the appropriate A-Z page (e.g., the A-B page (public link).
Revision Statements: Revision statements will be used to determine if, and then where, resources will be listed on the "New and Updated" page (public link):
If a resource that has a revision statement from the previous or current month when an "Update Browse Pages" job is ran, it will be listed on the "New and Updated" page.
If a resource has a single revision statement, it will be added to the "New" column.
If a resource has more than one revision statement, will be added to the "Updated" column
Workflow
To run an "Update Browse Pages" job, first click the "Plug-ins" drop-down menu, followed by the Update Browse Pages option (public link).
This will redirect the user to a new page (public link) that notes--in addition to when the "browse pages" were last updated--the following information:
Collections to be added to browse pages: These collections are not currently listed on browse page(s), but will be added the next time an update is run. These finding aids include those that were published and exported for the first time in the past month.
Collections to be deleted from browse pages: These collections are currently listed on browse page(s) and will be removed the next time the browse page is updated. These finding aids include those that have been unpublished or deleted from ArchivesSpace (e.g., a collection that was merged into a larger collection as a series).
Collections to be updated on browse pages: These collections are currently listed on browse page(s), but their information may be updated the next time an update job is ran. These finding aids include those that have been updated at the resource-level in some way and so may change (e.g., may be moved from the "New and Updated" to another page).
Each list can be expanded to show the titles of and a link to each resource included in that particular example (see this example (public link).
Once the lists have been verified for accuracy, complete the updates by clicking the "Queue Job" button. This will take the user to an ArchivesSpace background jobs page for the scheduled update (public link), which will log the status of additions, updates, and deletions.
It is also important to note the following:
Depending on the number of collections included in an update, the job may finish in as few as 10-15 seconds or may take as long as 15-20 minutes. It is not necessary to remain on the background job page, or even leave the browser open to ArchivesSpace, for the job to complete.