2.3: Opening an Existing Collection

To open an existing collection, choose "Open" from the "File" menu to get the Open Collection prompt. A list of your Greenstone collections appears. Select one to see its description, and click "Open" to load it.

In case more than one Greenstone Librarian Interface program is running concurrently, the relevant directories are "locked" to prevent interference. On opening a collection, a small temporary lock file is created in its folder. Before opening a collection, the Librarian Interface checks to ensure that no lock file already exists. However, when the Librarian Interface is exited prematurely the lock file is sometimes left in place. When you open such a collection, the Librarian asks if you want to "steal" control of it. Feel free to do so unless you think that someone else is currently working on the same collection.

When you open a collection that the Greenstone Librarian Interface did not create, the Dublin Core metadata set will be assigned to it, and any existing metadata will be imported just as it is when you drag in files with existing metadata. The process is described in the Importing Previously Assigned Metadata section.