This document describes the functionality of the graphical user interface (GUI) of B2FIND. This is illustrated by a use case that aims in filtering out a subset of datasets which fulfill several search criteria.
Supported and tested browsers are
- Firefox, version 45 or later
- Google Chrome, version 51 or later
Assure that JavaScript is enabled.
Your own CKAN installation (see module Install CKAN) or access to the B2FIND portal (we are open !).
If you want to use your own CKAN installation or the CKAN demo, please open the respective website. In this case you can use the search functionality which comes with the default CKAN installation or those that have been installed in the demo version. That means that some queries we use here only work for the B2FIND portal.
On the top you find a general query field for free text search and ondiv the left-hand in the navigation bar side several preimplemented interfaces and pop up menues are provided to perform facetted search.
Submission results are shown in the panel on the right hand side of the page. By default, i.e. upon initial opening of the page Facetted search you will find a list of all datasets.
In the following sections we illustrate the usage of the interface by inspecting several 'search use cases', i.e. specific searches in the B2FIND catalogue for the facets listed in the B2FIND schema ).
We start with some simple list requests.
Clicking on the tab Communities in the top of the website results in a view of the logos of the communities integrated in B2FIND.
By clicking on one of these logos more detailed information about the community is shown.
In other installations of CKAN, as in the CKAN demo site, you can instead use the tab 'Groups'.
Excercise 1 : Get more information of the community PDC. Check their website and get some information about the kind of research this community is involved with ?
Excercise 2 : List all tags (keywords) available for the community CLARIN.
Excercise 3 : List all datasets (packages). How many records does the B2FIND catalogue comprise ?
In the following sub section we explain first how to search on single facets and finally we provide the result of a full combined search, which leads hopefully to the desired results our researcher needs for her own study.
Excercise 4 : Search not only for coast, but as well for coastline and coast line. How you interprete the results ?
In the navigation bar on the left search interfaces for the textual facets Tags, Creator, Discipline, Language and Publisher are offered. If you click on one of the facet fields a list of clickable values is displayed and a autocomplete field for filtering are opened.
The facet Discipline is defined only in the B2FIND schema) and there is no related CKAN default field.
Again we first display all available disciplines and shrink the resulting value list to all including 'Env'. Finally, filter for all datasets belonging to a specific research field, in this example we choose Environmental Science.
In B2FIND the facet Creator corresponds to the CKAN default field Author and a full list of available names can be shown again by clicking on the corresponding facet field in the navigation bar.
To filter all datasets created by 'Dustin Whalen' we use first the autocomplete functionality by entering 'Wh' in the corresponding field Filter to shrink the list over shown values to a manageable number.
Finally we can select the desired name:
Excercise 5 : How many datasets are created by 'Dustin Whalen' ? Take into account that you get all Creators with last name Whalen. What is the general problem hereby ?
Excercise 6 : Who created the most datasets of PDC?
We would now like to filter data objects which cover a specific region or periode. This information is only available for a subset of the metadata records in B2FIND and CKAN.
For these facets describing coverage the additional implementation of CKAN extensions are needed, as done for the B2FIND service and at least the geospatial search as well for the CKAN demo site.
This feature is implemented in B2FIND through the adapted CKAN extension ckanext-spatial.
Excercise 7 : Which continents are covered by PDC datasets ?
This facet is developed and implemented in B2FIND through the CKAN extension ckanext-timeline.
To search for all datasets whose temporal extent overlaps with the 20th century, click on the Filter by time button to open the widget chart.
Now, you can pre-select the time period at the bottom of the Histogram that overlaps with the 20th century. This results in a graph showing Number of datasets over Time in the upper part of the chart. Here you can also zoom into the time line by dragging the mouse cursor over a subsection and choose the periode in the time-line by holding the <Ctrl>-key and clicking with the left mouse key first on the start point and then on the end point, as shown in the figure above.
Excercise 8 : Find all datasets in B2FIND which cover the year 1880 .
This facet is developed and implemented in B2FIND by the CKAN extension ckanext-datesearch.
To search e.g. for all datasets which are published in the period of 1990 to 2016 go to Publication Year and select the appropriate decade widget to select the desired years.
Excercise 9 : Find all datasets in B2FIND that are published before 1400. Analyse and interprete the result.
The combination of the single requests above corresponds to the following use case.
A scientist is interested in research data on polar coasts. She knows that the 'Polar Data Catalogue' offers access to this kind of data. Furthermore, she knows that her colleague Dustin published some interesting datasets about this topic in the past 26 years. In the first step she restricts the search result on research concerning coasts to the 20th century. In the second step she filters for studies on a particular coastal region at the northern boarder between Alaska and Canada.
In other words search for all datasets that fulfill each of the following criteria :
- The word
coastis found in the full text body of the metadata record - The data belongs to the community PDC
- The data is created by
Dustin Whalen - The data is origined from the discipline
Environmental Science - The spatial extent has an intersection with a small section of the northern costal line at the border between Alaska and Canada
- The temporal coverage has an overlap with the
20th century(maybe this leads to no further restriction because the subset of datasets contain no information about their temporal coverage or the latter lies already within the selected period) - The data is published after
1990and before2016
The sequential excecution of all associated search requests will step by step reduce the set of datasets found and finally lead to the following result page :
Above the list of the dataset titles the choosen textual facets are shown. By clicking on the related crosses in the value fields each faceted filtering can be undone again.
In the navigation bar on the left the spatial and temporal extent is shown. You can reverse one ore multiple of these selections by pressing the Clear button in the asociated widget.
Excercise 10 : Combine all these search criteria by conducting several search requests sequentially. Try different orders and modified values for teh single requests.
Excercise 11 : Build your own search use case and analyes and interprete the results.