topic Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco in Alfresco Archive

How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Tue, 04 Oct 2016 19:26:40 GMT

I am a developer who is trying to implement an alfresco community edition. I am very new to alfresco, but am trying to figure out how to implement a complicated metadata structure for a document library. I want to be able to assign values to documents which can then be used for the search. I have

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

openpj — Wed, 05 Oct 2016 11:24:41 GMT

Hi Tyler,

you can do all these things with Alfresco, below some details:

- want to easily assign values to documents (sometimes using rules if possible)

You can define your own content model for using specific content types and you also can define aspects for defining groups of properties and associations that you can attach on contents.

Content modeling | Alfresco Documentation

- I want these values to be pulled from lists, that admin users (non-technical but higher permissions) are able to edit and change

Ok for this requirement you have to implement a custom constraint in Java that allows you to get all the values as nodes or properties value in a specific tree inside the repository. You can use the NodeService or the SearchService for getting contents in the repository.

- these values are hierarchical

The unique way for having an hierarchical approach is using categories for that specific fields or you can implement you own selection field logic for the presentation tier.

- I want to be able to filter the document library by these values (and if you filter by a top hierarchy, all inner valued files are shown)

Again you can use categories or a customized field that manage your own value policy that is aligned with tags or again categories.

- I want to be able to search the entire system for these values
- When I perform a search, I want faceted results for these fields
- there are 5-8 distinctly different fields that have this same type of information

This is just a configuration when you have implemented all the previous point.

Hope this helps.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Wed, 05 Oct 2016 13:54:10 GMT

Thanks for the response, its a lot what I have been seeing out there, but I still cant seem to understand how it will work, so I have a few questions.

- I want these values to be pulled from lists, that admin users (non-technical but higher permissions) are able to edit and change
Ok for this requirement you have to implement a custom constraint in Java that allows you to get all the values as nodes or properties value in a specific tree inside the repository. You can use the NodeService or the SearchService for getting contents in the repository.

If I go the route of using categories, then alfresco I could just leverage the category manager for this, which is win-win. A question I would have though, is there any way to get rid of the Category Root thing? or would I have to look into how to do that in certain pages, cause Its kinda annoying.

- these values are hierarchical
The unique way for having an hierarchical approach is using categories for that specific fields or you can implement you own selection field logic for the presentation tier.
- I want to be able to filter the document library by these values (and if you filter by a top hierarchy, all inner valued files are shown)
Again you can use categories or a customized field that manage your own value policy that is aligned with tags or again categories.

I would love to use categories, as they seem to offer a lot of what I want, but I noticed a few things about them that I didnt understand. First in the search, I was unable to get the search service to index the category field, or atleast to get categories to show up as facets in the search without an custom. Maybe this is easy to do, do you know if this is possible?

Also, even though categories are hierarchies, it seems in the document library library filtering, if I choose A which has sub cat B and C, I only get documents that are specifically category A, not B and C, which I would want also? Any idea if this is just a setting I am missing or something more complicated

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Wed, 12 Oct 2016 22:40:51 GMT

Hey Tiler

My tip to you for the item below

- I want these values to be pulled from lists, that admin users (non-technical but higher permissions) are able to edit and change these values are hierarchical

For this, you can use my addon available here: GitHub - douglascrp/alfresco-value-assistance: Configurable value assistance module for Alfresco Share that allows pickl…

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Thu, 13 Oct 2016 19:55:54 GMT

This looks like exactly what I want, but when I download it and run the run.bat script, I get the following error. Do you know if the amps are anywhere to be downloaded? or do I have to build it myself? if so, how can I get past this error

[INFO] Scanning for projects...
Downloading: https://repo.maven.apache.org/maven2/org/alfresco/maven/alfresco-sd
k-parent/2.1.1/alfresco-sdk-parent-2.1.1.pom
[ERROR] [ERROR] Some problems were encountered while processing the POMs:
[FATAL] Non-resolvable parent POM for org.orderofthebee:alfresco-value-assistanc
e-repo-parent:1.0: Could not transfer artifact org.alfresco.maven:alfresco-sdk-p
arentom:2.1.1 from/to central (https://repo.maven.apache.org/maven2): sun.secu
rity.validator.ValidatorException: PKIX path building failed: sun.security.provi
der.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification pat
h to requested target and 'parent.relativePath' points at wrong local POM @ line
12, column 13
@
[ERROR] The build could not read 1 project -> [Help 1]
[ERROR]
[ERROR] The project org.orderofthebee:alfresco-value-assistance-repo-parent:1.
0 (C:\Users\tlovejoy\Desktop\alfresco-value-assistance-1.0\alfresco-value-assist
ance-1.0\alfresco-value-assistance-repo\pom.xml) has 1 error
[ERROR] Non-resolvable parent POM for org.orderofthebee:alfresco-value-assis
tance-repo-parent:1.0: Could not transfer artifact org.alfresco.maven:alfresco-s
dk-parentom:2.1.1 from/to central (https://repo.maven.apache.org/maven2): sun.
security.validator.ValidatorException: PKIX path building failed: sun.security.p
rovider.certpath.SunCertPathBuilderException: unable to find valid certification
path to requested target and 'parent.relativePath' points at wrong local POM @
line 12, column 13 -> [Help 2]
[ERROR]
[ERROR] To see the full stack trace of the errors, re-run Maven with the -e swit
ch.
[ERROR] Re-run Maven using the -X switch to enable full debug logging.
[ERROR]
[ERROR] For more information about the errors and possible solutions, please rea
d the following articles:
[ERROR] [Help 1] http://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/MAVEN/ProjectBuildin
gException
[ERROR] [Help 2] http://cwiki.apache.org/confluence/display/MAVEN/UnresolvableMo
delException

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 14:42:32 GMT

Can you please give more details on how you tried to package the project?

Post here the folder structure you have when you download the sources, and in which folder you were when you tried to run maven.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 14:47:20 GMT

I downloaded the zip for git, and then I just ran the run.bat in the repo directory to create the amp file to test it out to see if it would meet my needs.

trying to read through the pom files now to see whats going on.

Folder Structure is just like zip

Root
->alfresco-value-assistance-repo
->->run.bat
->alfresco-value-assistance-share
->->run.bat

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 17:16:07 GMT

Bat, so I guess you are on Windows.

The thing is, I never tried to execute a sdk project on Windows.

Can you try another approach, which is to simply build the addon and get the amps to install on your server?

Inside of each of the folders, alfresco-value-assistance-repo and alfresco-value-assistance-share, execute

mvn clean install

Let me know how it goes.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 17:49:33 GMT

Thats how I got that error I pasted in here, I tried the run first and then that one...

Can you just put the amps in there?

I believe there error has to do with the fact that the pom files are pointing to some parent project that doesn't seem to exist in the git

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Fri, 14 Oct 2016 18:01:13 GMT

Ok Tyler Lovejoy, there you have it

Release 1.0 · douglascrp/alfresco-value-assistance · GitHub

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 14:10:15 GMT

I was able to get the amps installed, but now I am trying to set up the addon for my document library. I see the readme on the git site has some stuff about putting into the share-config-custom but when I do that, it doesn't work, I do not see the field available on the site. Do you have anymore information on how to set up the document library with these field?

Also, Is it easy to make these fields searchable?

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 14:42:13 GMT

Do you have a custom content model with a custom attribute you want to provide the list of options?

You should have something like a custom document type for Contract, and a custom attribute like, Status.

With that sample, you would have to configure the attribute Status to show the values from the datalist you created, like, Contract Situations.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 14:55:11 GMT

I am starting with a fresh alfresco to test if this will work for my data. I am using a list of States and Cities. I created the Lists in the data Lists section with some data. The States as Level 1 and the Cities as Level 2. Now that I have that, how do I add that to the document library? Preferably in the data properties.

I created a Model, but I am unable to add these fields to that model, I am assuming there is no interface for this and I have to do via an xml file, but its not obvious how to do that

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 16:24:46 GMT

You need to create a custom type with the two new attributes, and then, for each for them, you have to include the configuration as described at the project's page.

All you have to do is to configure Share in order to show your custom type with the custom control for the new attributes.

I'm providing a link to a tutorial where you can see how Share forms are configured for custom types Working With Custom Content Types in Alfresco | ECMArchitect | Alfresco Developer Tutorials

I hope that helps you to understand the process.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 17:56:09 GMT

I understand that process, but after I create the types, then I try to go into the xml and make them your types, thats where I am getting hung up. Everytime I try to change the xml, it doesn't work. It seems as though the information on the front page or in the readme is only part of the solution, so I was wondering if you could include a full example of the xml needed.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Wed, 26 Oct 2016 18:10:09 GMT

You have a full config file distributed inside the project as a sample.

Please, check this out alfresco-value-assistance/share-config-custom.xml at master · douglascrp/alfresco-value-assistance · GitHub

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Tue, 13 Dec 2016 20:53:31 GMT

So I am still trying to get this to work, when I install it with your amps, it creates some demo fields which I cannot get to work. It also doesn't make any changes to the share custom config file. Is this supposed to work? or are these just placeholders? I do not see the models when I go to model manager, however the aspects are there. But if I add those aspects to a file, it throws a big error.

Also, the share-config-custom.xml.sample that is included in your project does not have any alfresco-value-assistance related information in it as far as I can tell. If I am wrong, can you point to which lines or set of lines? I do not see anything. There is a share-config-custom in the META-INF folder, but that xml file never makes it into my alfresco. Should it be in there? If so, where? After searching thru the logs, this is the error I am getting:

Caused by: freemarker.core.InvalidReferenceException: The following has evaluated to null or missing:
==> field.control.params['level'] [in template "form-controls/dynamic-dropdown.ftl" at line 58, column 34]
Tip: If the failing expression is known to be legally null/missing, either specify a default value with myOptionalVar!myDefault, or use <#if myOptionalVar??>when-present<#else>when-missing</#if>. (These only cover the last step of the expression; to cover the whole expression, use parenthessis: (myOptionVar.foo)!myDefault, (myOptionVar.foo)??
The failing instruction (print stack trace for 14 more):
==> ${field.control.params["level"]} [in template "form-controls/dynamic-dropdown.ftl" at line 58, column 32]
at freemarker.core.InvalidReferenceException.getInstance(InvalidReferenceException.java:98)

Not sure if you have any ideas... Please let me know

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Mon, 19 Dec 2016 16:08:06 GMT

So after messing a round a bunch I was able to get this to work, quick question though, does this allow multiselect of any kind? or just the drop down boxes? I see a dynamic-selectmany file, but I cannot tell how to turn that on. Let me know

Thanks!!!

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

douglascrp — Tue, 20 Dec 2016 00:51:47 GMT

I'm using this project without problems here.

Could you share your full project somewhere?

I cannot help you by looking at the error logs you are sharing. I need more information to make sure I understand the problems you are facing.

Re: How to best implement Metadata for Alfresco

tyler_lovejoy — Tue, 20 Dec 2016 14:57:18 GMT

I solved that problem, with the first example (colors), you do not list what level you want to go down in the config, which throws that error. I put level 1 and it worked.