Hi Dee Dee,

These searches are possible through the interface, though you may need
to add a field or two to the query configuration. For both of these,
you'll rely on the "Not Equal to" feature in Advanced Query.

1. Objects with no Media attached: 
Because it's the one field I've found that seems to work reliably for
this search, I most commonly use an Objects module advanced query search
of:
LoginID (MediaXrefs) <not equal to> * 
The asterisk acts as a wildcard - so, in effect, the query is "Media
Xref LoginID not equal to anything". Note that, in my experience, the
Rendition Number field doesn't return results with this query - I don't
know why.

2. Objects with no donor:
This one's trickier. If you search for "Role not equal to Donor", you
may very well get some records with Donors in your results because the
search returns any record for which it is true that there is a
constituent who is not a Donor (for example, we have a few records with
both a 'Donor' and a 'Contributor' (contributed funds) under
acquisition-related constituents).
So - the trick is to first search for all records with Role = Donor and
make an object package of those records. Then, go to advanced query and
search for all objects where "Object Package Name is not equal to XXX
(the name of your saved package of objects with donors)". From that
point, you can narrow the search further. Of course, object packages are
not dynamic, so you have to update the object package each time you run
the query.

Good luck!

Best,
Jeri

--------------
Jeri L. Rojas-Moxley
TMS Specialist
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
212-423-3509
[log in to unmask]


-----Original Message-----
From: The Museum System (TMS) Users [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
On Behalf Of Valdeva Ives
Sent: Wednesday, July 26, 2006 5:26 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Searching question

Hi everyone,

We are new to TMS in general and have some query questions.

Does anyone know if there is a way to search for data that isn't there
via TMS (not using SQL queries from the back end)?
Some questions that have been asked are:

1.  How do you search for a list of objects that have no media attached
to them?
2.  How do you find all of the objects that don't have a specific type
of constituent attached?  (eg.  objects with no donor)

I can generate these queries from SQL but it would be nice if the
non-technical staff could do it for themselves.  Is the only option to
use a list view or report?

Thanks in advance for any help!
Dee Dee

--
Valdeva Ives
Application Developer and Support Specialist Digital Information and
Technology Harvard University Art Museums
32 Quincy Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
617.384.9389