About attributes

Note: You can view and modify the attributes of an element only in a library, not in a project.

An attribute is information associated with an element that provides detail about that element, such as its file size or type. In Synapse EyeMedia, you can search for an element in a library using attributes. You can also use attributes to record information about an element for later reuse.

Attributes are made up of name/value pairs. For example, an attribute might have the name Resolution and the corresponding value 300 dpi, or the name Artist and the value John Smith. A collection of elements might all have the same attribute name (such as Resolution) but varying values.

You can view and modify the attributes of an element in a library. (For instructions, see Viewing and modifying element attributes.) The attribute names that you see when you view an element’s attributes are defined in the system’s attribute templates, which are set up and maintained by your system administrator. Therefore, when you modify an attribute, you can change only its value, not its name. For example, you could set an element’s Resolution attribute to 300 dpi, but you could not delete the Resolution name or change the name to something else.

As well, you can modify only some attribute values. When you view an element’s attributes, three tabs appear in the Attributes dialog box. You can generally modify the values of the attributes on the Customer and Site tabs. However, you cannot modify the values of the attributes on the System tab; these attributes (file creation date, size, type, last accessed date, and last modified date) are extracted by the operating system and are automatically populated.