MEF improvements

Date	2008/08/14
Contact(s)	Francois, Mathieu
Last edited	Timestamp
Status	Complete
Assigned to release	2.5
Resources
Ticket number	#173

Overview

Improving existing MEF format to support more than one metadata in a single MEF file. This mechanism will allow the export n metadata records in a single MEF file with an adequate structure. An export button is added to the search result page.

Proposal Type

• Type: Module Change
• App: GeoNetwork
• Module: Metadata Import/Export

Links

• Documents:
  • ​http://trac.osgeo.org/geonetwork/wiki/MEF
• Email discussions:
• Other wiki discussions:

Voting History

• Vote proposed 2010/01/24 by Francois
• PSC members
  • +1 Jeroen
  • +1 Simon
  • +1 Patrizia
  • +1 Francois
• Community
  • +1 Mathieu

---

Motivations

Export more than one metadata (and associated files and metadata) in a single MEF file.

Proposal

MEF 2 improvements:

• multi-metadata support : be able to have more than one metadata record in a single MEF file.
• multi-metadata format support : be able to store in a single MEF n formats (eg. for ISO profil, also store ISO19139 record)
• related metadata export : export related metadata in the MEF file. Related metadata record could be :
  • child metadata (Using parentUuid search field)
  • service metadata (Using operatesOn search field)
  • related metadata (Using xml.relation.get service)

Add an export selection in search results panel.

Add some unit tests for XML, MEF1, MEF2 and copy/paste (MEFIOTest and XMLIOTest) testing import and export operations on XML and MEF file.

MEF structure proposal

MEF v1 :

Root
 |
 +--- metadata.xml
 +--- info.xml
 +--- public
 |        +---- all public documents and thumbnails
 +--- private
           +---- all private documents and thumbnails

MEF v2 :

Root 
  | 
 + 0..n metadata
     |
     +--- metadata
     |     +--- metadata.xml (ISO19139)
     |     +--- (optional) metadata.profil.xml (ISO19139profil)
     +--- info.xml
     +--- applischema
     |     +--- (optional) schema.xml (ISO19110)
     +--- public
     |     +---- all public documents and thumbnails
     +--- private
           +---- all private documents and thumbnails

MEF Export

MEF import check which MEF version to use on import (user does not have to specify which version to use).

Mechanism:

• 1.If uuid add this metadata to the selection manager
  • 1.search child and add to selection manager
  • 2.search service and add to selection manager
• 2.if not use the selection manager
• 3.Export to MEF

MEF export include an iso19110 record in applischema directory (relation is defined in RELATION table).

In some situation a child or related service may have different user privileges. If related records are not accessible for current user, they are not exported.

Format parameter (simple, partial, full) is also supported in V2.

MEF Import

A preferred schema parameter is added to config in order to define which file to load when more than on file is found in a MEF file. If no record with preferred schema found, use first valid one (in a schema known by current node).

Other minor changes to import/export services

• Stylesheet parameter is not mandatory (default is none)
• Category parameter is not mandatory (default is none)
• Add uuidAction parameter to copy/paste import

Backwards Compatibility Issues

• None. Tested harvest mechanism with 2.0 or 2.2 node using MEF 1 format.

Risks

Participants

• Francois, Mathieu