Task
Description
Help page link/s
Check what RME components are provided
When RME is licensed, the institution defines which components they wish to use. Only these components will be displayed.
Components included in the license have product keys. These are marked in the Product Key page with a green tick. This page also allows you to import a new key, if necessary.
Set up Org. Units
You need to create an organisational structure in RME before you can create new records. Usually, the org structure in RME mirrors that of the HR system.
The organisational structure comprises many organisational units (Org. Units) such as faculties, research centres, schools, departments, administrative divisions (such as the Research Office) and groups.
Org. Units reflect your organisational structure so that records, such as personnel or projects, can be affiliated to one or more units.
Org. Units are also used to filter records and data. The Org. Unit assigned to a User record gives that user access to all records that have the same Org. Unit affiliation.
Create relationships between Org. Units to create an organisational structure
Link all the Org. Units via relationships to create the Org. Structure.
There are two types of relationships (links) in RME for Org. Units:
• Administrative link - reporting parent and security access (default)
• Data link - security access only
An Org. Unit can be linked to many other Org. Units, however, it can only have one administrative parent.
The data link is used for data security purposes and should be specified only if you want to allow access to all the records of a particular Org. Unit that isn't reporting to the unit.
Define global labels
You can change over 200 heading, field or text labels that appear in more than one location in RME.
Global Label Preferences are only applied to fields that are referenced with square brackets [ ] in Page Views. For example, if the global Project label is changed to Grant, then Grant will appear throughout RME where the field is referenced by square brackets in Page Views.
Set up custom header, footer and Home page notices
You can configure the system header, system footer to suit your organisation and reflect your organisation’s terminology and branding.
You can customise the RME Home page by adding noticeboard widgets with your own notices, information, links or images.
Images must be placed on the RME Server. Refer to the RME Installation Guide.
Set up roles
Roles are used to allow easier functional security configuration for users. Roles are a predefined set of multiple Page Views, and access to reports and eForms templates.
RME comes with a default set of system roles that covers a range of expected users in the system. The RME Application Admin user role, for example, has all Page Views assigned to it, giving anyone assigned this role full access to all pages and sections in the system. Compare this to the Researcher role that has access to a limited number of Page Views that gives them access to records in the Projects, Ethics and Research Outputs modules.
You can also create your own roles to suit your institution's needs. When assigning a Page View to a role, the following access types are available:
• Full Access
• Create-Edit Only (cannot delete any records or related items)
• Edit-Only (cannot create or delete any records or related items)
• Read-Only
Customise Page Views
A Page View is a view of a physical RME page that can be assigned to a role or individual user to control access to a particular page.
RME comes with a full complement of default Page Views for RME. These normally consist of either a full list or a subset of available data fields defined for the page.
In Page Views, you can:
• Set a field so that it is displayed in the search page grid
• Set the order in which the field is displayed in the grid
Tip:
In the first column of a grid, such as in search results, related items
and eForm listing pages, a link is applied to the data text that opens
each item. Make sure the field you select as the first column is a mandatory
field, or will always have data, otherwise there will not be any text
on which to apply a link. In this case, items can still be opened by selecting
the checkbox and selecting Open
in the toolbar.
• Change field properties via either the Configure Field Properties button, or Layout Designer button if this feature is licensed. Using either button allows you to:
• Re-label field names
• Define field access as mandatory, optional, read only or hidden
• Include a default value for the field
• Update a field’s tool tip (description)
• If Layout Designer is licensed, change the page layout to suit your needs.
Assign Page Views
Page Views can be edited and assigned to roles or users via Role Page Views or User Page Views related items.
You can also create more than one Page View for a physical page, for example, to assign each to a different role.
When a user has a role assigned, the Page Views for that role are automatically assigned. You can create, configure and assign additional Page Views to the user separately in the User record, if needed.
Set up users
Set up user accounts, assign roles, and define Org. Units and other data security.
If needed, assign individual Page Views in addition to those provided in role/s.
Data security in RME is based on a user record and the following related items in the user record:
• Org. Units (user departments; only visible when the All Level User? setting is No)
• Project Access Security
• Contract Access Security
• Fund Scheme Access Security
• Ethics Category Access
The system checks the Org. Units linked to the user record. If an Org. Unit against the record matches the user’s Org. Unit or is a child of an Org. Unit linked to the user, the system continues with the check of the User Project/ Contract/Fund Scheme/Ethics access values.
If the project/contract/fund scheme/ethics / HDR record has the type that matches one of the values against the user record, the system allows access to the record.
In addition to this if a user is linked to any of the records either as a researcher or as a user who created the record, the system allows access to those records.
Set up external users
You can configure RME to provide access to people that do not exist in the system, such as external researchers, students, supervisors or examiners, to access the system.
Their access can be limited to specific pages, records and eForms by the use of default roles and AOUs (Org. Units).
Control auditing and create custom fields
Enable or disable auditing database tables, as needed
Create custom fields for some module search pages (Projects, Ethics, Research Outputs or Personnel)
Set system preferences
You can configure the system to best suit the needs of your institution by defining preferences globally (across the system) and within individual modules.
Tabs are provided for different types of configuration.
In the System tab, you can control database auditing. If enabled, this records the actions of system users. Auditing allows you to identify the difference between current record data and previous data for the same record. Tables that have auditing enabled in Table Auditing (above) will be included.
Set up categories and items
A category is a collection of values displayed in a dropdown that relate to specific fields in RME. You can also set up custom categories.
Some categories are system categories and the details cannot be modified. However, most categories allow you to add, edit, and delete category items. You can set all category items to current or non-current, as well as choosing a default value, if desired
Any default values set up in Category Items will be overridden by any default values set up in the Page Views.
Set up ethics categories
You define ethics categories based on government requirements and you can created them for animal ethics or human ethics. The ethics category determines the ethics specifics details that may be entered as a related item to an application.
Set up research output categories
Research Output categories are used to classify research outputs according to the requirements for government reporting under HERDC and ERA. You may also create Research Output categories for internal purposes, to capture research outputs that are not required for government reporting, such as theses or written reports.
Set up custom classifications
RME supplies the standard research classification codes used in Australia and New Zealand (ANZSRC) to classify research under the Field of Research (FOR-08) and the Socio-Economic Objective (SEO-08).
If you require additional classifications, you can create your own.
Set up user codes
Codes are used to identify different entities throughout the RME system, for example, a committee code or project ID.
For each module that allows user code configuration, you can choose whether the code should be manually created by the user, or automatically generated by the system using a specific pattern.
Set up account code formats
Account codes can be used throughout the RME system. They must match the account codes in your financial system so that the financial data can be transferred between the two systems.
Before you can create an account code, you need to configure the account code format.
Each account code format is comprised of a number of segments. Segments can be up to a maximum of 10 characters, separated by a delimiter and marked as either essential or non-essential. RME supports more than one current account code format.
Set up account codes
Account codes are created to identify individual financial accounts and used to administer project funds, internal fund schemes or funds awarded to specific personnel.
When creating account codes, they must comply with the appropriate account code format. There can be more than one current account code format so when creating account codes ensure that the correct format is selected.
Set up committees
A record may need to be associated with one or more review committees. Committees may be required to perform mock reviews, reviews or other assessment roles for projects, ethics or contracts and IP.
A committee record contains information about the current status of the committee, type, valid from and to dates and modules where the committee is available.
You can associate members to the committee. If panels members are associated to a committee, they will display in this record. You can select the RME modules where the panel can be used.
Set up panels
Panels may be appointed to review and assess applications for internal funding, pre-assessment of applications for external funding and assessment of ethics applications. Panels may form part of a committee. A panel record contains information about the current status of the panel, type, valid from and to dates, and modules in RME where the panel can be added as an assessor panel.
Members can be associated to both panels and committees. You can select the RME modules where the panel can be used.
Set up facilities
Facilities are physical resources such as buildings, rooms, equipment owned by your institution. Facility records enable you to use the system to help manage them. You can create a record for each facility that can be reserved for use by researchers, committees, postgraduate students, or to perform the work of a specific project or application.
You can link these to other records in RME for projects, ethics, personnel or students.
Set up fund schemes
Create records for the funding bodies, both internal and external, that you will be using
Set up licences
Create records for licences that may be required by personnel engaged in particular activities or for facilities used for specific activities.
You can link these to other records in RME for projects, ethics, personnel or students.
Set up organisations
Create a record for your institution and mark it as Primary.
A list of organisations is automatically provided with RME. You can create additional records for any external organisations that your institution deals with that has not been included, for example, those that provide funding in which external personnel maybe employed, or in which facilities may be used for research.
Create Significant Events
Significant Events are used to create and store all the events that are considered significant to the core record. Create Significant Events to suit your processes in each module.
Each event includes the event details, occurrence, and completion details.
Email notifications for the event are created and managed in the Email sub-item.
RME administrators with the Batch page action can attach one Significant Event to multiple records.
Significant Events - Research Outputs
Significant Events - Contracts
Significant Events - Personnel
Define scripts to automatically create or update Significant Events based on core field changes
The Application Trigger page allows IT specialists with solid JavaScript knowledge and experience to define scripting rules that will automatically create or update Significant Events based on changes or updates to core or related item fields, as specified in the script. Samples are provided to give you an idea of what is possible.
Essentially, you create a rule so that when something happens in the specified core or related item fields, the rule is triggered so that one or more Significant Events will be created or updated. The fields that you can use in this feature are defined in a spreadsheet provided in the Create a trigger help page.
Create your own reports
The Report Designer is used to create, publish and manage the reports that appear in RME via the Reports button on the core module toolbar.
It is part of the RME Designer application that must be installed locally on an administrator's machine.
The RME Report Designer uses report views that are created specifically to be used in reports, and also contains de-normalised foreign key fields to simplify the report writing process. For example, person's name is available where person code is referenced.
RME Report Designer Guide in the package
Set up Crystal Reports
If you use Crystal Reports, add them to RME.
Create email templates
Email templates allow you to specify common content and formatting for the email messages associated with particular Significant Events. Email templates in RME are associated with a particular module.
The email templates you set up for a module are accessed when you create an email for a Significant Event for a module record. When creating a new email, users can choose to use a template, customise a selected template via the Customise button, or enter details directly in the page from scratch.
eForm configuration
If you use eForms, refer to the detailed documentation for RME Designer provided in the package.
In RME, you can configure the following to support eForm and workflow processes:
• Create email templates that you want to use with eForms and associated workflows.
• Set up standard phrases for use in comments in eForms per domain, for example, for reviews.
Error messages
If you find that an error message does not suit your needs and cannot be resolved via Global Label Preferences, contact the ResearchMaster Support team for assistance.
Custom error messages are retained in upgrades unless an existing error message is changed by ResearchMaster for a release. This is quite rare. In this case, the custom error message will not be updated when upgrading to that release. It would need review and assistance if a further change is required.
RME Installation and Upgrade Guide, Personalise RME > Request a default error message change
Insert custom help content or create and use custom help pages
RME comes with built-in online help for each RME page in the system. When a user clicks the Help link, the help page about the currently viewed RME page will display.
To allow you to customise online help to some degree, there are two options: a) you can add limited text and links to a defined section within the default help pages, or b) you can create and manage your own help pages and display those instead of the default help pages.
eForm help
While the default RME Help includes generic content about eForms, such as layout and key features, these help pages cannot be linked to any eForm contextually as eForms are individually created and do not have static IDs. When designing eForms, there is an option to include element-level help within the form itself. For details, refer to the RME eForm Designer User Guide.
RME Installation and Upgrade Guide, Custom online help
Page View - Help page field to select your own help pages