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Entities and Attributes
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Data Entities:
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In LabPlus, the data structure that contains a group of similar “records” is called an “entity”. In other words, an “entity” is analogous to a database table, and a “record” is one row of the data contained in the table. Product specifications, list of clients, samples and list of instrument are all examples of entities.
Entities can be added to the system to adapt the application to your laboratory’s specific data management requirements.
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Generic Entities:
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LabPlus contains over 100 generic entities. These generic entities were selected based on our exhaustive LIMS experience and consist of what is usually required for the management of a typical laboratory. The inclusion of generic entities enables your laboratory to profit quickly from your investment in LabPlus because you can start using it right after the installation. Analytical instruments, projects, products, specifications and samples are examples of generic entities. |
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Configurable Entities:
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As stated previously, it is also possible for your laboratory to extend the generic entities by configuring new ones for your specific needs. Custom entities can be related to existing ones or to other custom entities and can take part as any other entity in workflows and business rules.
This feature of LabPlus system provides a level of flexibility which, until now, has only been available in custom built LIMS applications.
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Entity Functional Patterns:
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Entity Functional Patterns are special pre-designed features that can be enabled or disabled for every entity.
Following are examples of Entity Functional Patterns
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- History, Audit, and Notification: used for traceability of actions and modifications performed to a record of an entity; notification can be used to further define actions to be taken when a change occurs.
- Comment and Attachment: allow users to store additional information (text or documents (PDF/Word/Excel/GIF/JPEG/etc.) with a record of an entity; multiple comments and attachments can be linked to a single record.
- Set: allow the grouping of several records of the same entity or of several individual elements under a common denominator.
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Entity Attributes:
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Every entity contains attributes, which are analogous to database fields that are used to store data for a record. It is possible to add or modify attributes regardless of if and entity is generic or custom. For instance, you could decide that in your laboratory, in addition to generic attributes, a customer entity, will contain the name and number of an emergency contact.
Following are some examples of the available attributes’ datatypes:
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- Number: Double (for decimal number), Integer (whole number, positive and negative)
- Text: Reference (drop-down list), String (single box, 1 line)), Text (text style, multiple lines)
- Data Set: Set (named group of values)
- Other: Boolean (check-box), Caption (multilingual), Date, Time, and Date-Time
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