URL Structure

For consistency and reliability when linking to entities in Digital Collections, we recommend using URLs structured according to the guidelines below

Collection URLs
1. Finding UUIDs for Collection URLs
Container URLs
Item URLs
1. Finding UUIDs for Item URLs
Capture URLs
1. Finding UUIDs for Capture URLs

Collection URLs

By default, the Digital Collections browser URL bar displays a URL with an encoded version of the collection title in lieu of the UUID. We do not recommend using this URL as it is less stable and links will break in the event a collection title is changed.

Preferred structure: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/collection UUID
Example: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/dba41b30-0ae6-0137-bfb0-4fa251ecd76a

Finding UUIDs for Collection URLs

On Digital Collections, find the UUID by clicking the About tab for a collection
- Universal Unique Identifier (UUID) will be found at the bottom of the Collection Data sidebar under Identifiers
In the Metadata Management System, the UUID can be found immediately below the collection’s title following the uuid: label on any tab for the collection

Container URLs

Container URLs should be treated as less stable as they change when containers are reordered or new containers added.

Container URLs are built on their corresponding collection URLs. When creating links to Digital Collections containers, ensure the base collection URL utilizes the collection UUID (see Collection URLs) rather than the encoded collection title.

Containers within Collections URLs

Preferred structure: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/collection UUID/?tab=navigation&roots=container sequence number followed by a : (only appears after first container in a collection)container UUID
Example (1st container): https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/dba41b30-0ae6-0137-bfb0-4fa251ecd76a/?tab=navigation&roots=4c8bac10-0ae7-0137-4c89-5dcd471e46f5
Example (subsequent containers): https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/dba41b30-0ae6-0137-bfb0-4fa251ecd76a/?tab=navigation&roots=2:4d690980-0ae7-0137-49ea-3790db43fb92

Containers within Containers URLs

For nested containers, the URL structure pattern following ?tab=navigation&roots= is repeated for each container, separated by /.

Preferred structure: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/collection UUID/?tab=navigation&roots=1st container sequence number followed by a : (only appears after first container in a collection)1st container UUID/2nd container sequence number followed by a : (only appears after first container in a collection)2nd container UUID
Example: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/collections/dba41b30-0ae6-0137-bfb0-4fa251ecd76a/?tab=navigation&roots=2:4d690980-0ae7-0137-49ea-3790db43fb92/2:7d05c7b0-c2ed-0139-8462-0242ac110003

Finding UUIDs for Container URLs

On Digital Collections, find the UUID at the very end of the URL in the browser URL bar
- If the container is nested, the UUIDs for the root container and all other parent containers will also be present in the URL
In the Metadata Management System, the UUID can be found immediately below the container’s title following the uuid: label on any tab for the collection

Item URLs

Item URLs can be generated with the item UUID (e.g. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/item UUID), but this URL structure does not work consistently for audio and moving image resources, so we recommend using the UUID of the first capture of an item to construct item URLs.

Preferred structure: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/capture UUID for first capture of item
Example: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/ce44a320-cafb-0139-d939-0242ac110002

Finding UUIDs for Item URLs

On Digital Collections, select the first capture for an item
- The full capture URL—including the capture UUID—is populated as the Permalink, which can be found to the right of the Image ID field directly below the image viewer
In the Metadata Management System, find the UUID for the first non-suppressed capture of an item on its Capture inventory tab in the UUID column

Capture URLs

Preferred structure: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/capture UUID
Example: https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/ce95c650-cafb-0139-aded-0242ac110002

Finding UUIDs for Capture URLs

On Digital Collections, the full capture URL—including the capture UUID—is populated as the Permalink, which can be found to the right of the Image ID field directly below the image viewer
In the Metadata Management System, the capture UUID can be found in the capture record or Capture Inventory tab
- From a capture record, the UUID can be found immediately below the capture’s title following the uuid: label
- From the Capture Inventory tab on an item record, capture UUIDs will be shown in the UUID column