The "character" tab lets you change basic character information such as character name and the notes for the character as well as add, edit and delete character states.

	Warning
	Currently MorphoBank does not distinguish between upper and lower case characters - all names are case-insenitive. This can be an issue for some types of characters, dental characters for example, where upper and lower case names have historically been used to represent different characters.

To add a state, click on the "add state" button or on the blank area in the state list under the last state. A new state will appear in the list. Click on the name to edit it. To reorder states click on and drag the state in the list by its number to the desired position. The states will automatically renumber themselves such that they are always sequentially numbered starting from zero. To remove a state, click on the state in the list, highlighting it, and the click on the "remove state" button.

Any number of project media may be attached to either a character or character state using this screen.

The screen lists all character states. To add an image to a specific state, click on the "add" button for the state. A media selector window, as shown in the figure below, will appear allowing you to locate and link media from your project.

To find media to a character or character state, type a search into the "search for" text entry and click on the "find media" button. As shown in Figure 11.6, “Attaching media to a character” a list of relevant media will be displayed. Click on the desired media and click on the "add" button to link it to the selected state or the character in general.

The search performed by the "media" field to find relevant media is broad, searching on the following data:

You can search for partial matches by using the asterisk ("*") wildcard character. For example, to find all media associated with words starting with the letters 'dent' search on 'dent*' Similarly, to find media associated with words ending is 'ism' search on '*ism'

Figure 11.5. The character media tab

Figure 11.6. Attaching media to a character

You may add character-specific labels to images associated with specific characters. To do so click on the thumbnail of the image in either the character editor "media" tab or on the small thumbnail images appearing next to characters and states in the character list. list. A new window will appear, as shown in Figure 11.7, “Character image viewer and labeling of character images” below. You may add labels to the image in this window in the same manner as is done in the matrix editor or media editor (see the section called “Labeling images”). Note that labels added in this window will only appear when the image is displayed for the selected character. When the image is used in other contexts (eg. in a matrix cell, or as a depiction of the specimen) these labels will not be visible.

Figure 11.7. Character image viewer and labeling of character images

All project members - full or observer - may add comments to any character or state in a project. Comments are recorded with the date and time they were made and the identity of the commenter and are displayed in the "comments" tab listed with the most recent first. You may also add a comment to the character or a specific state by clicking on the "add comment" button at the bottom of the screen.

The number of comments associated with the character and its states is displayed in the character list in a column labelled "#C". Numbers in bold indicate characters for which there are unread comments. You can bring up the comments tab for a character directly from the character list by clicking on the comment count for that character..

Comments are a permanent part of the project record and cannot be changed or deleted once made.

Figure 11.8. Adding a comment to a character

A log of changes made to a character and its constituent parts - states, media, notes, etc. - is kept and may be viewed in the "change history" tab. Each change is noted with date and time, the identity of the member commiting the change, and the precise value of each field after the change.