6. COMPLETING AND USING THE EVENTS STANDARD FORMATS CONTENTS OF THIS CHAPTER  A STEP BY STEP APPROACH  DATA ENTRY  MORE ABOUT LINKING RECORDS Attaching Formats for Additional Information  RELATIONSHIPS OF THE VARIOUS FORMATS: A SUMMARY  EXAMPLES OF COMPLETED FORMATS This section provides general guidelines for the organisation of information following the HURIDOCS Events Standard Formats. Specific instructions for the entry of data into each format and field can be found in Chapter 8. Scope Notes. 6.1 A STEP BY STEP APPROACH 1. First complete the Event Format to provide an overall account of what happened. 2. Next complete the formats for the different persons involved. 3. Link these records together where needed, by completing the link formats, e.g. the Act Format to link a Person as Victim to the Event, or the Information Format to link a Person as Source to the Event, or a Chain of Events Format to link two Events together. 4. Complete the attachment formats if there is additional information, e.g. an Additional Details: Torture format to supplement the information in the Act Format. 6.2 DATA ENTRY Where appropriate, HURIDOCS encourages the use of codes, rather than descriptors, as the form of entry of information, as they are quick to record and facilitate retrieval, particularly when the data are being held in computerised databases. This could apply both to the field identifiers themselves (field tags [numerical] or field names [descriptive]) and to the information entered, e.g. a geographical code or the full name of a country or location. 51