A custom field describes a customized input field for meta-data and is defined by a specific data-type and a set of additional options & rules. A custom field can be re-used across multiple custom types independent from the entity-type of the custom type.

The following custom field input types can be achieved by the respective abstracted data-types:

Data types:

• Text

  • Single input text

  • Multi input text

  • Text area

  • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

• Number

  • Integer

    • Single input number

    • Multi input number

    • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

  • Floating point numbers

    • Single input number

    • Multi input number

    • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

• Toggle (boolean)

• Date

  • Date only

    • Single input date

    • Multi input date

    • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

  • Datetime

    • Single input datetime

    • Multi input datetime

    • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

  • Datetime range

• Time

  • Time only

    • Single input time

    • Multi input time

    • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

  • Time duration

• Entity references

  • One of Dataset, Instrument, Inventory, Notebook, Notebook entry, Notebook experiment, Notebook template, Method, Organization, Person, Project, Sample, Shared Content

  • Single input entity reference

  • Multi input entity reference

• Entity barcode

• Attachment

  • Single file input

  • Multiple files input

• URL

  • Single input url

  • Multi input url

  • Selection dropdown (single or multi input)

Options and Rules:

Depending on the data type some custom fields may or may not have one or more of the following options & rules:

• Placeholder: Description displayed to users if the input field is empty. Example: “Enter temperature and pressure corrected volume here”

• Is multi selectable: Determines wether the input is a single- or multi-value input field.

• Make field required: This will enforce that this input field cannot be empty and must be defined.

• Make field read-only: Mark this field as a read-only property.

• Validation regular expression: Add a customized regular expression for validation of the input field.

• Validation message: A customized message to be shown if the regular expression validation fails.

• Default value: A default value to be suggested to the user when creating new entities.

• Show options from values: Creates a dropdown from all values entered into this custom field with the possibility to create new values.

• Fixed options: Define a custom selection dropdown that a user must choose from.