Default Values for Resource Templates

Hi, I’m very excited about the new features in Omkea S, particularly the resource templates. I was wondering if there are plans to be able to assign default values to a property using resource templates.

In working with classic Omeka I frequently have items with the same metadata for some fields. Each time I add a new item, I have to manually enter the same metadata each time. For example, I might have 30 items with the subject “foo.” Every time I add a new item, I have to add “foo” as a subject.

For Omeka S, it would be awesome if a property in a resource template could have a default value, like “foo,” so that every time you added an item with the resource template, it would have the value already assigned. This would make adding similar items much faster, as you would only have to put in the metadata that differs between items.

I know you can do a controlled vocabulary with the “Custom Vocab” module, but that only makes sense if there are multiple possible values for an item.

If this feature is already in Omeka S and I just can’t find it, please let me know where to look. Otherwise, I hope this feature is added in an upcoming version!

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I don’t think we can do that currently, and I’m not entirely sure what would be involved, but I’ll bring it up as we plan the next steps and priorities after the 1.0.0 release.

One twist is that it sounds like you’re thinking of text values, but to really do this I think we’d want to make it available for internal references and URIs, too. The internal references would make for something of a UI challenge.

Yeah I mentioned text because that’s what I’m used to with Omeka classic, but obviously those new values for Omeka S would also be needed.

I hope for and eagerly await this feature in an upcoming version of Omeka S! My colleges have also expressed interest in this feature, and I’m sure there are others.

Supporting this feature request.

Yes, good request. Would be great to see this feature soon.

Instead of extending the UI of the resource template edit page, we could use ‘item copying’ feature to create an item with default values.

For example, I have just posted a Pull-Request that adds ‘item copy’ buttons to the item list of the admin dashboard. (same feature is also provided by ‘ItemCopy’ plugin)

https://github.com/omeka/omeka-s/pull/1503

Here’s a screenshot.

As shown in the above figure, by putting some items holding default values, you can simply create a new item from them. The copying feature also can be accessed via URL like …/item/ITEM-ID/copy, it is easy to add some special links to create the items with the default values to your admin dashboard.

Hello, @Bosterm.

Just noticed your post… see whether the new Item Duplicator plugin can help you with Omeka Classic.

Cheers!