New records are added to the Quest DR collection in a two-stage process. The first stage entails the use of a web-based data entry form (currently backed by a FileMaker Pro database) in which all data fields are provided. In the second stage, a number of records from that database that have been reviewed for validity are mechanically transformed into MARC records, and bulk loaded into ALEPH by library staff. Corrrections and enhancements of the contents of those records must then be done with the ALEPH Catalog application in a Windows environment.
To minimize the manual edits required on metadata records, the following standards must be followed in providing data fields to the entry form.
| Field name | MARC tag | Standards |
| Title | 245,0,0 | First word and proper nouns capitalized, ended with a period. |
| Alternative title | 246,3,0 | Required field: ALL CAPS, may be hyphenated, must be unique in DR |
| Publisher Name | 260, b | Should end with comma |
| Publication Year | 260, c | May be a single year or a hyphenated range; can refer to years of coverage of the data |
| Description | 520 | Do not embed carriage returns in text |
| Subject (Category) | 653 | Choose from popup menu. If category is not available in Quest Advanced Search, notify Baum |
| Subject (Coverage Unit) | 653 | Choose from popup menu |
| Subject (Cross section units) | 653 | Enter a number or range of numbers only |
| Subject (Time series) | 653 | Do not use unless there is a time series dimension to the data. If used, enter a number and time unit (e.g. 45 years, 120 quarters) |
| Subject (Frequency) | 653 | Choose from popup menu; ignore if there is no time series dimension to the data |
| Subject (Variables) | 653 | Enter a number or range of numbers only |
| Subject (Type) | 653 | Choose from popup menu |
| Access/Format | 516 | Choose all available access methods for this dataset with checkboxes |
| Access/Format | 516 | Choose all available data formats for this database with checkboxes |
| Subject (Keywords) | 653 | Capitalize initial word only of each keyword entry, terminate with period, separate additional keywords with commas. Whenever possible use keywords already in the metadata |
| Identifier URL (More information) | 856,4,0 | For each URL: enter standard prefix (e.g. data format, 'codebook', 'documentation', etc.), semicolon (;), URL; separate URLs by commas. E.g. Codebook; http://foo.com, SAS; http://foo.com/data/ |
| Principal Investigator | 700,1 | Enter name of entity (terminated with period) or person. Person's name should be given as Lastname, Firstname, terminated by period. |
| Note (Contact) | 500 | May contain an email address |
| Note (Comment) | 500 | Field should be used to note a print version of documention in the libraries with the Call Number. |