Set Metadata on Directory

It seems that it is impossible to set Metadata on a directory - iwextattr -l on a directory gives NextExtAttr failed, and if I select a directory before calling the MetaTagger GUI it only allows me to set Metadata on the files in that directory, not the directory itself.

The issue for me is that I need to develop something that generates an index for a given directory. Each file in the directory has Metadata such as title that I can use to create the index, but the directories do not. I can't just use the name of the directory as the text of the link to a directory on the index page, I need to capture a title.

Has anyone else come across this issue and if so, what are you doing about it?

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Comments

Adam Stoller

Since directories are not treated as versioned objects within TeamSite, it doesn't surprise me that you cannot set extended attributes on them.

Perhaps you can create a file for this purpose in each directory (e.g. "dir.idx") that you could either apply metadata to, or fill with information as a result of your processing?

The only other altnerative I can think of off the top of my head is that you farm out the file metadata to a DB and then generate the index per directory from there.

--fish
(Interwoven Senior Technical Consultant)

Migrateduser

I have a question about directories not being treated as versioned assets.

My understanding of NTFS is that files inherit permissions from the directory they are created in. So if I create a directory with a certain set of permissions, submit it, create an edition, create another workarea based on that edition, and create files in that directory in that workarea, they will get the permissions of the original directory. If I change the permissions on that directory and submit it to staging, how does the other workarea get the new permissions so that it applies them to new files created in that directory?

Does this mean you cannot tell what permissions were on any directory at any point in time other than the present?

Adam Stoller

Just looking at your last question:
Does this mean you cannot tell what permissions were on any directory at any point in time other than the present?

I believe that to be the case. Attributes associated with files are maintained along with the files, but directory data is not recorded as such.

--fish
(Interwoven Senior Technical Consultant)