Overview

Validate mode is where reviewers approve or reject contributor submissions. It appears in the header mode menu as Validate (Approve or reject submissions), and only for accounts with validation permission.

What is a Submission?

When a contributor finishes work in Contribute mode and presses Submit, their changes are packaged into a single submission. One package can contain either or both of:

• Metadata edits — changes to existing area records
• New area uploads — new polygons and their metadata, added from GeoJSON or shapefile

The validation interface labels each pending item accordingly, with badges such as Metadata, New Area, or both.

What Validators Do

Validators open the Submission review list, pick a submission, and work through its changes one at a time. For each change you can:

• read the contributor and organization details and the submission time
• compare original against proposed values for metadata edits, or review the geometry and metadata for a new area
• open View on Map to see the feature in geographic context
• add optional review notes
• choose Approve Change or Reject Change

Once decisions are recorded the queue refreshes, and contributor data is updated according to your backend rules.

Relationship to Contribute

Validation is the gate between contribution and publication:

Contribute (edit / upload) → Submit → Validate (review) → Accepted changes enter the published dataset

If Validate does not appear in your mode menu, your role is not configured for review. Use Explore or another mode available to you, and ask an administrator if you believe you should have review access.

See Also

• Validation system — the step-by-step interface and governance context
• Contribute — edit metadata