Access to Memory (AtoM)

Background

In 2.2, we are adding the ability for archivists to embed nested EAD elements inside the Extent and medium / Physical description field, to help reconcile the granularity of EAD with the big bucket approach of the content standards (like ISAD, RAD, and DACS).

Theoretically, users can embed the following elements inside the Extent and medium field:

<extent></extent>
<dimensions></dimensions>
<genreform></genreform>
<physfacet></physfacet>

When saved, AtoM will hide the nested EAD elements from the display page. This allows more granular EAD during export, without sacrificing the presentation for end-users.

We have also added escaping to the field, to avoid export errors when special characters like unencoded ampersands are included.

Error encountered
Right now, if nested tags are present during export, they are escaped along with any other unencoded special characters.

On roundtrip, this means that the nesting no longer works. When re-imported, AtoM interprets the escaped content as plain text, resulting in something like this:

<physdesc encodinganalog="3.1.5"> Extent and medium, ISAD 3.1.5. Can include
        nested tags like:&lt;lb/&gt;<lb/>
        &lt;dimensions&gt;Dimensions&lt;/dimensions&gt;&lt;lb/&gt;<lb/>
        &lt;extent&gt;Extent&lt;/extent&gt;&lt;lb/&gt;<lb/>
        &lt;physfacet&gt;Physical facet&lt;/physfacet&gt;&lt;lb/&gt;<lb/>
        &lt;genreform&gt;Genre form&lt;/genreform&gt;    
</physdesc>

Expected behavior
AtoM should not escape the EAD elements listed above, or the <lb/> element used to preserve line-breaks.