Explorer
The Explorer lets you browse the structure of a metadata profile and compare two profiles side by side. Open it from Explorer in the header.
Browsing a profile
The Explorer opens on the first profile in the list, so there is a diagram to read before anything is chosen. To look at another:
- Select a profile under Base Profile (Reference).
- Click Explore.
The profile's entities and fields are drawn as an entity–relationship diagram. Use the canvas controls to zoom, pan, Fit the diagram to the view, and arrange it: Layout places the entities by force, which keeps entities joined by a reference together, and Tree places them as the containment tree the specification describes, root at the top. Tree is a toggle and is highlighted while the tree is shown. Zoom in on an entity to read its fields.
Exporting
The toolbar after Tree exports what is shown. PNG is the whole diagram as an image, with its legend. MD, CSV and XLSX document the first profile's model: the entities in containment order, root first, each field with its type, whether it is required, description, constraints and example; MD as a Markdown file, CSV as one row per field, XLSX as a workbook with Entities, Fields and Rules sheets. In the spec builder the same three buttons next to Export document the draft.
Comparing two profiles
- Select a Base Profile (Reference).
- Select a second profile under Compare Against.
- Click Compare.
Both lists hold the built-in standards, the published specifications you may see, shown as <name> (Published), and drafts: your own and those shared with you, shown as <name> (Draft). A published specification and a draft each have one entry per name, with its versions in the version selector beside it. When a draft shared with you has the same name and version as one of your own, the entry loads your own.
The diagram overlays both profiles and highlights the differences:
| Legend | Colour | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Common | green | Present and unchanged in both profiles |
| Added | blue | Present only in the compared profile |
| Removed | red | Present only in the base profile |
| Modified | amber | Present in both but with field-level differences |
| Conflict | purple | Present in both with incompatible field attributes |
Green means the two profiles agree. The canvas, the legend and the entity panel use the same colours, and every state also carries a glyph (= + - ~ !) so the distinction does not depend on colour vision.
Entity details
Click an entity to open the Entity Details panel. It shows the entity's status, which profiles it is Present In, and the field-level differences (added, removed, or modified fields).
Filtering
In compare mode, the Show/Hide controls let you toggle which entities are shown — common, base-only, or compare-only — so you can focus on the differences. Show All restores everything.