Understanding the Dashboard

Core Functions and Features

Once you've logged in, the left-hand side of the dashboard should contain a card with a list of core instructions and requirements. Please review these carefully! They're critical to ensuring that you're able to use the website properly.

They're listed here again with some more information to better explain what they mean:

• Use the selection menus to pick your site, plot, and census.

• The navigation menu will not become visible until you have selected a site, plot, and census.

• You will need to submit supporting data before being able to submit new measurements for your census.

  • Before you can submit new measurements for a census, you'll need to submit some supporting data that's needed to make sure that your measurements are correctly correlated to the right location, plant, or time period. This supporting data makes up the navigation links under the Stem & Plot Details navigation menu.

  • Stem Codes:

    • Attribute information for a stem

    • Allows you to add characteristics like 'alive', 'dead', 'missing', etc. to a stem. This becomes important later -- it's important to make sure you don't accidentally mark a stem as dead when it's not!

  • Personnel:

    • Who's working on the plot?

    • This data is organized on a census-by-census basis, so you can clearly see who was working on the plot at what time.

    • You can also assign a role to a person, which can include anything from 'plot supervisor' to 'field technician' to 'volunteer'!

  • Quadrats:

    • This is a more granular system to subdivide the plot. Each plot can be massive, but dividing it into quadrats can make it easier to keep track of each stem.

    • Quadrats, like personnel, are also organized on a census-by-census basis, so you can get a better idea of how the plot was divided for a particular census.

  • Species List:

    • Species information for all stems in the plot.

    • This is a dedicated list of the different species designations assigned to stems in the plot.

  • Plot-Species List:

    • This is a special case! This is a list of all species listed in the plot, but filtered by stems physically located in the plot. It's always possible that species in a plot come and go as environmental conditions change, so this is a way to take a look at species assignments specifically at the place and time you're working with. You shouldn't need to modify or add to this view -- it should be used for reference only!

User-Specific Information

To the right of the core instructions and requirements, you'll see a card with a list of user-specific information. This includes:

• The role you've been assigned

• The sites you have access to

• The email address associated with your account

You should use this to make sure that you have the right permissions. If you don't for any reason, please use the feedback form link (located in the bottom right corner of the window) to create a GitHub issue for website administrators! If you can't find the icon, please click on the chip that says "This is a feedback form" to highlight its location.

Now that you know how the dashboard works, let's switch gears and focus on the sidebar on the left-hand side of the screen!