Editing Field Properties

To edit the properties of a field – for example its description or its input field type – first find the field using the search function in the Attributes section. Switch to the view page of the field properties by clicking on the name of the field in the list entries. Click on the Edit button on the view page of the field. The Content Management Server displays the Configuration Management – Fields – Edit form:

You can change the field definition at any time (provided you have the permission to change global settings). It is therefore possible, for example, to shorten or supplement the list of enumeration values for the Selection or Multiple Selection field type. However, such changes can result in draft versions becoming incomplete because the value of one of their fields is no longer in the list of permitted values.

General Properties

The uppermost area of the form contains the same data as the form for creating a new field. However, the name and type of the field cannot be changed.

Special Properties

The variable properties of a field depend on its type. The most important field properties are:

Selection/multiple selection: Values You can enter the possible values for fields of the types Selection or Mutliple Selection. To do this, enter all the values the field can have in the multiple-line Values input field. Please note that only one value per line can be entered.
HTML: Wanted tags For fields of the HTML type, you can define here the tags the user is permitted use. Specify the tags (without the enclosing angle brackets) in the Wanted tags multi-line input field. Enter only one tag per line.
Linklist: Minimum and maximum number of links For fields of the Linklist type, you can enter here the minimum and maximum number of links the field accepts. The CMS checks whether the number of links contained in the field is in the specified range. If this is not the case, the corresponding file cannot be released. From version 6.7.2, link lists may be empty without causing an error if the demanded minimum number of links is not equal to zero. To force a link list to be non-empty, make it mandatory in the file format.

Functions

The behavior of fields can be extended by means of custom functions. If you would like to define one of the functions for fields, click on the Functions button to open the Configuration Management – Fields – Edit – Functions form:

Value Display Function

The value display function is a Tcl routine used to calculate the value of a field to be displayed in the HTML user interface. The function is called when the value of the field is set. Two values are passed to the function:

value: The field value. The Tcl routine can read out this value and reset it if necessary
contentId: The ID of the version containing the field value. Via the version parameter objectId (content withId contentId get objectId) you can, for example, read out the file format belonging to the file in order to display different values depending on the file format.

The Tcl routine can return error messages by means of the error command. If no Tcl code is given for the value display function for a field, the original value of the field is displayed. The routine only has access to the Content Manager data in read-only mode. In particular, the field value is not changed by setting the value parameter.

Value Assignment Function

The value assignment function is a Tcl routine which the Content Management Server executes each time the value of the field is changed. Use this feature for example to check whether a field has a valid value and to change the value if necessary. To the Tcl routine two arguments are passed:

value: The field value. The Tcl routine can read out this value and reset it if necessary
contentId: The ID of the version containing the field value. Via the version parameter objectId (content withId contentId get objectId) you can, if required, read out field values of the file to which the version belongs.

The Tcl routine can return error messages with the error command. The routine does not have write access to the data in the Content Management Server.

Input Fields

For all fields except those of type Signature, you can define the type of input field the user may use to set the field value. To do this, select the type of input field from the popup menu.

The input field types the Content Management Server offers in the Input Fields popup menu depend on the type of the field you have defined. The following types are defined in the Content Management Server:

Input Field Type	Description
Single Line Text Input Field	This type is available for fields of types String, Text, HTML and Date.
Multiple Line Text Field	This type is available for fields of the String, Text and HTML type.
Password Field	This type is only available for strings. Characters entered into this type of field are displayed as another, always identical character. The field is used for password entry.
Popup Menu	This popup menu is displayed when the user can determine the value of a field of the Selection type.
Radio Button	For fields of the Selection type, the Content Management Server displays a list of possible values. A radio button appears in front of each list element with which the element can be selected. Only one element in the list can be selected.
Multi-Selection Box	For fields of the Multiple Selection type, the Content Management Server displays a list of permitted values, from which the editors can chose as many as desired.
Checkboxes	For fields of the Multiple Selection type, the Content Management Server displays a checkbox in front of each permitted value which the editors can activate. You can activate as many checkboxes as desired to select the corresponding values.
TinyMCE	As with the HTML editor, users can comfortably edit the values of HTML fields with this WYSIWYG editor.
Read-only	Select this type when the user is not to be able to enter the field value in the HTML user interface. The Read-only type is available for all field types.
Link List Field	Fields of the link list type can be edited using the dialog Edit Link Lists. A starting folder for selecting the link destination can be specified. Furthermore, you can restrict the files to be offered for selection by specifying their file formats. Enter the names of the formats as a space-delimited list.
Wizard	Fields of all types except signature can be edited using a wizard. To the wizard specified the standard arguments plus the additional arguments `wizard.attributeName` (name of the field to edit) and `wizard.contentId` (ID of the draft version) are passed. The wizard itself needs to store the field values that have been modified.

To determine the details for the input field selected, click on the Details button. A form appears in which you can determine the details for the respective input field – e.g., the width of text fields:

Enter the desired details of the input field and click on OK to return to the Configuration Management – Fields – Edit form.

Click OK to save the changed field properties. The Content Management Server then re-displays the field's view page.