CollectionBuilder MIME type for hyperlinks?

[izalex03]

Hi all, I'm working on a collection made up predominantly of links to articles on the internet. All my hyperlinks in my metadata are https links, so I don't think the links themselves are the issue. However, I'm not sure what MIME type CollectionBuilder uses for hyperlinks in the format column - and the IANA list isn't any help; I've tried application/link+format and application/http to no avail, it still won't embed once I create the collection page on GH and access to site.

I've attached a couple screenshots that show the properly-working videos and PDFs, and then this weird ghost file. I think the issue is in the format column of my metadata. I just have no idea how to resolve it.

Here, clicking on the "download object" button does link to the external site. But I would have thought there would be a way to display the link differently... and I don't really want users to have to click a button to get them to the content I want to display.

So, TLDR: what's the correct format entry/MIME type for external links on CollectionBuilder? And, any way to get the links to embed or display once you've built the collection out?

Any help is much appreciated - it's my first time building a collection on my own!

[evanwill]

@izalex03 if your items are external links, the convention in CB-GH is to use the value record in the "format" field (instead of a valid MIME type), see: https://collectionbuilder.github.io/cb-docs/docs/metadata/gh_metadata/#format

[izalex03]

Evan, thank you so much, you're a lifesaver! Is there a way, when you use the record value in the format field, to then display a snapshot of the website within collectionbuilder, or is it a no go?

[evanwill]

Not if you are using CB-GH. CB-GH was designed to be pretty basic.

However, in CB-CSV you can--it works a little different. Rather than the "format" field, it uses "display_template" to determine how to display the Items, and "image_thumb" and "image_small" for optionally choosing representative images. If you use the record "display_template", you can still set thumb images which will display. So you could take screenshots of the website, put them in your project (say "objects/example.png"). Then in the item's metadata the "object_location" would be the full link to the website, the "display_template" would be record, and the "image_thumb" would be /objects/example.png, etc. See: https://collectionbuilder.github.io/cb-docs/docs/metadata/csv_metadata/#strongly-suggested-fields

[izalex03]

Thank you so much. You guys are wonderful :)

[izalex03]

Evan, one more question if you don't mind.

I've updated all the video formats (thank you for the tip) - but some of my external links are to video players and the video/mp4 format isn't allowing them to play in CB-GH. For example, a link to this DailyMotion video player tagged with video/mp4 or video/html just shows up as a black box that says "no video with supported format and MIME type found." Is there another format I can use that would enable the video player to function - or should I just make these videos under the record format and have the external link?

You've been such a massive help already, thank you so much!

[evanwill]

@izalex03 CB-GH supports embedding videos for only for youtube and vimeo (using "youtubeid" and "vimeoid"), or can load actual video files (generally a mp4). So you're right, out of the box it won't embed dailymotion etc and the best option is to use the record format instead.
Ultimately, if the platform supports embedding via iframe, you could customize your project to be able to load the video, but would take a bit of code editing!