nowdatabase/documentation/entities/museum.md

Museums

Museums are institution lookup records that can be linked to localities. The museum record itself describes the institution; the locality tab stores which museums are connected to a locality.

Database model

The main museum lookup record is com_mlist:

• museum (primary key, museum code)
• institution
• alt_int_name
• city
• state_code
• state
• country
• used_morph
• used_now
• used_gene

Locality links are stored in now_mus:

• lid references now_loc.lid
• museum references com_mlist.museum
• composite primary key: lid + museum

Deleting a locality cascades its now_mus rows. Deleting or renaming a museum code needs care because the code is part of the link-table key.

API endpoints

• GET /museum/all: list museums
• GET /museum/:id: read museum details and linked localities
• PUT /museum: create or update a museum; requires an edit role

The detail endpoint supports tabular query options for the linked locality list.

Frontend usage

• /museum/:id? routes to the museum detail page.
• Locality edit views use the museum lookup list when linking museums to a locality.
• The Museum tab in locality details edits now_mus rows through the locality edit payload rather than by editing the museum record directly.

Validation notes

Museum codes are treated as stable identifiers. Backend tests cover creation, update, empty-code validation, and duplicate-code checks that differ only by case.