The Relate inspector is a tool that makes visible the often confusing and hidden connections between Relate elements.  It allows Relate administrators to explore anything and everything 'Relate' by how it is connected rather than by where it is located.  Because of this, it also provides an alternative navigation system which is often more useful and efficient than the normal navigation path.  Whether you are a new Relate user or an experienced Relate user, the inspector can make understanding and manipulating Relate easier.

The Relate inspector is available only to Relate administrators. It is accessed from any Relate component anywhere in the BlueStep platform. A link into the Relate inspector comes in two forms which are different in appearance.  The most easily recognized link appearance is an icon  showing three links of a gold chain. The more subtle link type is just the name of the element as plain text. The name is revealed to be an inspector link when you hold your mouse pointer over the name and it becomes blue and underlined. With either type of link, holding your mouse over the link for a few seconds will give the location of the component you will be inspecting. Clicking a Relate inspector link opens a pop-in window containing the inspector tool. To close the inspector tool, click anywhere on the bottom of the inspector window where the close button is located.

The Relate inspector looks at one Relate component at a time. The inspector tool has up to five sections:  

1. The top title area gives details about the element that is being inspected:  its name, type, location, usage settings and last modification information.  There is also a link to go edit the element.
2. The second section is the "Used By" section.  It lists details about every other Relate element that uses the current element.  The elements are sorted by element type.  The same information is listed about each of these items as is listed in the title area.  Also listed is a description of exactly how that element is using the current element.  Elements may be listed more than once if they use the current element in more than one way.  Clicking on an element's name switches the inspector to viewing that element.
3. The third section is the "Uses" section.  It lists details about all of the other elements used by the current element.  The elements are sorted by usage type.  The description column shows how the current element is using the listed elements.  All of the same information and options are available as described in section 2.
4. The fourth section is the "Children" section.  It lists Relate elements that are children of or contained by the current element.  The same information and functions are available except the description column is replace by a column listing the element's types.
5. The fifth section is the "Permission" section.  Unlike the normal permission screen it does NOT include inherited permissions, only permissions set directly on the current component.  Also, it does not include permissions granted to anything other than dynamic security groups.  The purpose of this section is not to assist in determining the actual permission levels assigned, but instead to figure out how dynamic security groups are used.  This provides full-circle analysis for the frequent, but otherwise obscure, usage of these groups which provide security based on Relate configuration and data.

Sections 2 - 5 may be missing if the are empty.  Also, the sections may be individually collapsed and expanded by clicking their title bar.  A section will start out 'open' only if it contains 10 or fewer items or if it is the only section with items to view.

Quite a bit of the available information is hidden in mouse-over pop-ups commonly called "tool tips".  A tool tip message is viewed by holding the mouse pointer over an element for a few seconds; doing a "mouse over". Mousing over the element's icon reveals the element's type.  Mousing over its name reveals its location.  Mousing over usage icons reveals their meaning.  Mousing over the colored "Age" square tells who last changed the element and when.  The color of the age square indicates how long ago an item was modified with shades of red changing to orange, yellow, green and finally pale blue as time progresses.  Clicking the age square navigates to change history for the component.   Color coding is also used in the usage column to allow scanning for a particular setting on a list of elements.

Tips for usage: 

• "I just need to make one small change."  The most time saving feature of the inspector tool is that you can jump immediately from viewing the results of your work to making changes.  If you are viewing a form entry and decide to change the label of one field, click the inspector link at the top of the page.  This opens with the current form for inspection.  In the "children" section find the field to be changed, click the edit link, make the change and save it.  Closing the inspector will automatically refresh the page and show the change just made.  For fields and option items, which are edited in pop-up windows, that's all there is to know.  To quickly change other types of elements it is helpful to hold down the Ctrl key while clicking the edit link.  This begins the edit in a new tab.  Switch to the tab, make the change, save, then close the tab.  Return to the original tab and refresh.
• "Where did I put that?"  Every Relate administrator occasionally forgets where things are located or what they are named.  Just find something that you know is connected to the lost element, whether in Relate or HQ, inspect it and start working back to the item that is missing.  By navigating from element to element you can find things by how they are used instead of what they are named or where they are located.
• "How did they do that?" Ever wonder how the thing you are looking at was put together?  The inspector tool will tell you everything that went into creating the magic, just look through the "Uses" section.  If that doesn't answer the question, click on an element in the list and see what it uses.  You can drill down as far as needed to see how everything fits together.
• "If I change this, what might be the side effects?"  Changing one little setting can have a big effect if other parts of Relate are depending on it.  While you are considering the edit, click the inspector link and peruse the "Used By" section.  This is a list of everything that might be effected.  Hold Ctrl and click the edit pencil of each item you are unsure of to get the full details.  Each item will be in a new tab.  Go through the tabs and check it out.
• "It was working, but it just broke.  What changed?"  The inspector can tell you at a glance what things have recently changed.  Go to the broken item, inspect it, and scan the age column.  The brighter the color, the more recent the change.  If nothing shows up, inspect some of the items used by the broken item to see recent changes to the elements that the current one depends on.