Users and Their Privileges

User Login: Morphbank users who wish to access, add and modify data will be required to login into the system with a valid username and password issued by Morphbank. To obtain a username and password go to the Header Menu > Tools > Login and then click on Request a Morphbank User Account in the Login Box. Alternatively, contact the Morphbank admin. group at mbadmin at scs dot fsu dot edu. After login, members see a list of the groups to which they belong. Without login, only published (public) information that can be browsed or searched by the casual user (specimen, image, publication, locality, view, annotation, taxa, or collection data) can be seen.

Privilege TSN: Members are assigned a Privilege TSN at the time their account is created. This Privilege TSN is the highest Taxonomic Name for which they have expertise and is primarily used in identifying groups that the member may belong to.

This model is being revised and soon will be less restrictive so that groups can consist of members from diverse fields.

Primary TSN: Members are assigned a Primary TSN at the time their account is created. This identifies the member's specific area of expertise.

Secondary TSN: Members are assigned a Secondary TSN at the time their account is created. This TSN identifies the area in which the user has an alternate area of expert knowledge.

Groups: Groups are comprised of users of the Morphbank system that share a common interest in a specific taxonomic area. Members in groups have access to data owned by the group. Prior to the data release date, only group members are allowed to view and comment on it. A Morphbank user may belong to more than one group but membership in a group is limited to the user's privilege TSN. No one may be assigned to a group that has a Privilege TSN outside that specified for the group. For instance, someone with a Privilege TSN of Hymenoptera may not belong to a group in the Plant Kingdom. Only Morphbank administrators and group coordinators have access to the group module that manages group membership.

Note this Group concept is undergoing revision. Soon Morphbank users will be able to:

Add any Morphbank member to their own group/s, regardless of the Group's taxon focus (Group TSN).
In addition, a user will soon be able to create their own group. They will no longer need to contact Morphbank to do this.

Note: Group members may appoint a trusted person to submit data on their behalf. That person will obtain a Morphbank account under their own name and become a user. Users entering data are listed as the "Submitter" on various Morphbank records. If entering data on behalf of another Morphbank member, the "Submitter" will choose the Contributor's name from the appropriate drop-down list in the submission process.

Roles: users will be assigned one of many roles within groups. Users may have different roles in different groups but may only have one role in each group for which they are members. Roles dictate what a group member can do with regards to the objects contributed by the group. The Coordinator of the Group decides and can change the role of each member in the group.

Guest without login has read only access. No login (no Morphbank User Account) is required for this user role. A guest user is only allowed to view information that has passed the release date. This applies to biological data only. The casual user cannot browse group or user information and may not make any data entries or annotations.
Guest within a group. This user has a Morphbank Account. Once logged in, the user can see all the groups to which they belong. If they click on a group where they have a guest role, they will be able to see objects contributed by that group (published and not). They will not have submit/edit/annotate privileges for these objects.
Scientist: For objects the Scientist has contributed or submitted to a particular Group, they have the authorization to add/modify/delete those objects. They may as annotate released (public) images within their taxon or images not released and owned by the group they belong to.
Lead Scientist has the same privileges as scientist but on all objects owned by the group. A lead scientist can also be a coordinator or group manager and therefore manage users and their permissions in a group. For now, a lead scientist sends a request to the Morphbank team mbadmin at scs dot fsu dot edu for creation of a group.
Coordinator has the same privileges as Lead Scientist and each group may only have one Coordinator. In order to be assigned a Group Coordinator, you must have lead scientist privileges for that group or have been assigned by the Morphbank administration. A coordinator can add and remove members from the group, change a user's role, as well as request spin-off groups to be developed with assigned coordinators. The coordinator can appoint another lead scientist in the group as a coordinator. Coordinators have access to the group module and members who fall in the taxonomic range assigned to the group.
Administrator There are very few individuals given Administrator privileges. An Administrator has complete access to all data and in addition can add/modify and/delete news, base or master tables. Only someone with administrative privileges can add new users and create groups for which there is no associated taxon. Those with administrative privileges have all rights in all groups and are responsible for managing the entire Morphbank system.

Submit: Access to input and modify data to the Morphbank database will be controlled by login access in accordance with the security module. Users who have at least the role of scientists can add images, views, taxonomic names, localities, and specimens. Those with roles of at least a scientist can modify their own data while group coordinators and lead scientists may modify data owned by any member of their assigned group. Users with this privilege must state (select) which group to which they are assigned before making such modifications. Note: see reference to appointing a Submitter above.

Browse: All users may browse images and data that have been released, but only users with authorization through login will have the options to select Morphbank objects like images, specimens and views for edit/update, annotation and collection. Logging in takes users to the new My Manager Morphbank interface (beta version).

The Browse module will soon be removed and the My Manager module will be the Morphbank database interface.

Collections: Login and group selection is required for all users who wish to make, edit, or annotate a personal collection or view, edit or annotate collections from other members of the same group.

My Manager: Morphbank's newest user-interface (Beta-version). Only logged-in users have access to this updated interface with added features. With My Manager, all objects in Morphbank are searchable via an enhanced Keyword Search and users can easily sort and limit searches to create, display, collect, edit, and annotate particular sets of objects. In the future, the My Manager user-interface will be the default and the current Browse interface will be phased out.

Contents