Updating Category Attribute value via Web Services

Has anyone had any luck updating attribute values within a category using the LL Web Services? For example, i have an attribute called Status within a category called Geography and i want to update that attribute value to ACTIVE or INACTIVE based upon some other criteria. I can get to the point of getting all of the correct values but when I attempt to update the attribute value, using the updateNode operation from the DocumentManagement Service, I continue to get an error message stating "Update of specified node type is not supported". I am supplying all of the original data back to the updateNode call with the exception of replacing the old attribute value with the new one. The getNodeByNickname operation is returning "GenericNode:412" as the node type which is in turn supplied to the update call as the type

Is there a better operation to use? I also looked at the updateCategory operation but it seems more geared to updating the category definition and not a particular attribute value within a category on a specific document/node.

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Comments

sgrasley

Hi, Kyle.

Unfortunately the UpdateNode method can only be used with those subtypes that have a ServiceNode definition (hence the error message you're seeing). Any node that has a type of "GenericNode:###" where ### is the subtype would exhibit this problem.

Thanks,

Scott

Paul_Serrate

Hi Kyle,

I am running into the same issue and was wondering what approach you took to fix the issue (if you have).

Thank you,

Paul

David Stange

I have the same issue.... Any suggestions?

Kyle_Swidrovich

The last two postings seem to indicate confusion about what the actual problem is here.

A ServiceNode is an server-side Oscript definition of a type of node for use with Web Services (like a Document, Folder, URL, etc.) These definitions are necessary for web services to know how to create/update these types of nodes.

The last two posters are being informed, via an error, that the nodes they are trying to update do not have a server-side ServiceNode definition for them. That is, the web services don't know how to update these things.

The only way to "resolve" this is to create a ServiceNode definition for that type of node by extending web services through Oscript to let the web service code understand how to update that node type.

David Stange

Agreed.... but the problem I think we are having is that we are trying to get/push data to objects that are ServiceNodes (in my case, a folder), but are having trouble formatting the updateNode call to properly push category metadata into these nodes...

Do you have some sample Java code for using the GetNode and UpdateNode to retrieve and update category metadata into folders?

I'm using Appian to call Livelink Web Services running on Java and we can't seem to get the values within the Attribute Groups either out of or into Livelink using these commands.

sgrasley

Hi, David.

Try calling GetCategoryTemplate() to get a structure that you can use for creating or updating the attributes on a node.

Thanks,

Scott

Pravin_Alhat

Hi Scott,

Do you have any working code snippet on changing attribute values after getting category template?

Thanks!

Appu_Nair1

If your intention is to update the values(metadata) in a node as a user would do from the GUI perhaps this smaple should help

If your intention is updating the categoryversion as an admin would do then this code does not help

                    DocumentManagement.AttributeGroup[] attributegroups = new DocumentManagement.AttributeGroup[1];                    DocumentManagement.DataValue[] datavalues = new DocumentManagement.DataValue[2];                    DocumentManagement.AttributeGroup attributegroup = new DocumentManagement.AttributeGroup();                    attributegroup = dc.GetCategoryTemplate(dmOTAuth, 559279);                     //once we get the categorytemplate we should put the values that need to go in                    //we have two fields in our category called NAME JOB both are manadatory                    /*SETTERS FOR INDIVIDUAL VALUES OF THE CATEGORY*/                    DocumentManagement.StringValue Name = new AddDocWithCategory.DocumentManagement.StringValue();                    Name.Values = new string[1];                    Name.Values[0] = "appu";                    Name.Key = "559279.1.2";  //VERY VERY BAD PARSING HARD CODING AT ITS BEST                    Name.Description = "my name";                    DocumentManagement.StringValue Job = new AddDocWithCategory.DocumentManagement.StringValue();                    Job.Values = new string[1];                    Job.Values[0] = "myjob";                    Job.Key = "559279.1.3";  //VERY VERY BAD PARSING HARD CODING AT ITS BEST                    Job.Description = "my job";                    //you go on adding the contorted data structure here                    attributegroup.Values[0] = Name;                    attributegroup.Values[1] = Job;Perhaps there are more better ways /less code.The full code is herehttp://www.tek-tips.com/viewthread.cfm?qid=1684806

Rune_Kristiansen

Hi,

This is a reply to the original poster and the original "answer" from OpenText. Yes, the nodetype is generic, but the metadata isnt! The whole db schema is transparent towards what type of object holds categories (metadata), surely the webservices should expose some methods of writing metadata to an object!

I find these web "services" to be frankly poorly planned and written. Furthermore, the WS library is recommended to use instead of LAPI allthough WS iteself use LAPI.

The ws library pushes developers to create creative "workarounds" which cannot be a good thing.

Sincerely,

Rune

Jason_Smith

Changes were made in update 9 to allow basic node updates to GenericNode types. So as of update 9 you will be able to update the category values on a GenericNode type using the UpdateNode() call.

Also, for update 10 we are adding a new SetNodeMetadata() method to allow you to just change the node metadata property instead of having to do a full node update.

Kyle_Swidrovich

Hi Rune,

Although the initial 9.7.1 release of web services (Enterprise Web Services) used LAPI binaries, the CS 10 version does not.
It is able to communicate directly with Content Server using its wire protocol.

Regards,
Kyle

Rune_Kristiansen

Hi,

Thank you for very good answers on the last two posts. I was not aware that this had been fixed in an update. Would this also apply for the Service Pack 2 update?

I mentioned lapi because the dll's reference lapiservice (opentext.contentserver.api) I just assumed this was lapi (since it has a lot of the old lapi elements in its binaries).

Thanks,

Rune

Jason_Smith

No, these fixes are not in SP2. The fix for updating GenericNode types is new in update 9 and the new SetNodeMetadata() method will not be released until update 10.