4. Installing the Collections application

Contains all adapl source text files with the .ada or .inc extension, and their compiled version (.bin).

Adapls are small, customizable programs that take care of certain tasks such as executing a Collections Task, or to check user input during editing of a record in Collections.

It may be necessary to create this folder in a fresh installation of Axiell Collections.

When upgrading Adlib for Windows to Axiell Collections this folder will contain Adlib executables and DLLs (e.g. adlib.lic and adliblic.dll) with their own system texts (.txt) and Help files (.hlp/.adh).

These files should not be deleted.

Licence files (.lic) are stored in this sub folder.

Note: When upgrading Adlib to Axiell Collections, you will find the licence file in this directory.

A sub folder will be available for each type of application that will be made available to users.

As we've seen, different models of the Collections application are available for different types of collection. For each application model made available to users there will be a sub folder with the same name. For example, there will be a sub folder called library+museum or xplus:

C:\Collections Application\xplus

Within each of these sub folders is an application structure definition file with a .pbk extension.

In the screen image above, only the XPlus application is available to users.

Contains language specific text files used by adapls, as well as Help files (.adh).

Adapls are small, customizable programs that take care of certain tasks such as executing a Collections Task, or to check user input during editing of a record in Collections.

These source files hold code and can be modified / created in a text editor such as Notepad++. Once compiled they can be used by Axiell Collections if specified in Axiell Designer.

Compiled .ada files have a .bin extension. Adapls can be compiled with Axiell Designer.

A collection of small programs run by a larger program as required.

Note: When an Adlib for Windows installation is upgraded to Axiell Collections, the \executables folder will hold DLLs that were required by Adlib and are not required by Axiell Collections.

An export job defined in Axiell Designer has a .exp extension.

ADAPL source code that can be used in several adapls can be put into a separate source file (a .inc file) and included in the compilation of a .ada file.

A .inf file stores the specification of the structure of a single table in the Collections SQL Server database, without the actual data. For example, thesau.inf holds details of the Thesaurus table. The file specifies all properties of the available fields in the table, their indexes, datasets (named, limited record number ranges), internal links and links to other tables. These files can be edited in Axiell Designer.

Datasets

A dataset is a subdivision of a database table by record number range. By default, a single dataset is defined for a table. The dataset specifies a record number range with a lower limit and an upper limit. In this example, we see that borrower.inf has a single dataset defined with a name of borrower and a record number range of 1 to 2,147,483,646 (this is the maximum number of records in a Collections database):

With Axiell Designer, it is possible to define multiple datasets for a database table however, each with a name and record number range. In this way a database table can be partitioned for various reasons, such as logically grouping similar types of records with a particular record number range. A Library Catalogue database might be partitioned into a books dataset, an articles dataset, a serials dataset, and an audio-visual materials dataset.

Tip: The data sources that a user chooses from in the UI of Collections are typically associated with a dataset rather than the entire database.

Specifying datasets to partition a database is also used to control access to particular records (or rather records within a particular number range).

For example, in a multi-tenancy installation of Axiell Collections a single database is accessed by all museums in a Museum group, but each museum may only be permitted access to its own object data. The Thesaurus table might be made available to all museums. In this case a single dataset would be defined in thesau.inf. However, if each museum should only have access to its own objects, then a record number range would be specified for each museum in both intern.inf and extern.inf and each museum would be restricted to accessing its datasets.

Registers which data sources The management of a collection can involve a vast amount of information about objects / items / books, people and organizations, events, administration and more. This information is stored as records in data sources. Each data source stores a specific type of information: details about collection items, people, events, loans, and so on. are accessible in a Collections application, and which access points (essentially fields to query), screens and output formats are available; application definitions can be edited in Axiell Designer.

Records exported in XML format have a .xml extension.

Adlib Internet Server is a separately licensed module; where it has been implemented, an Adlibweb.xml configuration file will be available.