Adding a Field to a Live Repository

EPrints 3.3+

Follow the instructions as you would for HOW TO: Add a New Field.

As described there, you define your new fields in...

• /opt/eprints3/archives/ARCHIVEID/cfg/cfg.d/eprint_fields.pl for EPrint-level metadata,
• /opt/eprints3/archives/ARCHIVEID/cfg/cfg.d/document_fields.pl for document-level metadata (this file doesn't exist by default, but is honoured),
• and /opt/eprints3/archives/ARCHIVEID/cfg/cfg.d/user_fields.pl for user metadata, etc etc.

Since a repository's eprint_fields.pl will override a flavour's eprint_fields.pl based on them both having the same file name, should you only wish to add to a flavour's fields rather than replace them, you may prefer to give your archive's local version a file name such as eprint_fields_local.pl, and then inside have only your new field(s):

push @{$c->{fields}->{eprint}},

{
	name => 'my_first_new_field',
	type => 'set',
	options => [
	    'yes',
	    'no',
	    'maybe',
	],
	input_rows => 1,
},

{
	name => 'my_second_new_field',
	type => 'set',
	options => [
	    'yes',
	    'no',
	    'maybe',
	],
	input_rows => 1,
},

;

Simply make sure your push, is adding your field to the correct dataset you wish to add fields to - in this case an eprint dataset.

Then, once you have added your new field definitions to the appropriate configuration file you can run update via epadmin from the shell:

./bin/epadmin update ARCHIVEID

EPrints 3.1+

EPrint 3.3's update is a synonym of the update_database_structure method available from Eprints 3.1+:

./bin/epadmin update_database_structure ARCHIVEID

EPrints 3.0

To add a field to a live eprints archive in Eprints 3.0 you have to modify the SQL tables. Before you start this, you may wish to BackupTheDatabase.

• Add the new columns to the appropriate tables. There are no longer four separate tables for eprints as there were in EP2 (archive, buffer etc), so it's simpler.
  • For a field defined in eprint_fields.pl, the tables are eprint and eprint__ordervalues_en (replacing en with your language as required).
  • For a field defined in document_fields.pl, you want document and document__ordervalues_en.
  • And so on...
• The column types are the same as for EP2, ie in eprint you want a type appropriate to the type of your field exactly as described in the Recipe for EP2, while in eprint__ordervalues_en you want text irrespective of your field type.

EPrints 2.x

See historical versions of this wiki page.