increment-metadata macro

Overview

The increment-metadata macro increments a numeric metadata value. 

The metadata value to be incremented can be a simple whole number value (e.g. 3) or a composite number (e.g. 1.0 or 1.0.0).

The increment can be specified or default to a simple increment of the last element of the metadata value.

A non-numerical character can be used to separate the numbers e.g.1‡2-4.

The macro can be be used to increment a metadata value to support custom versions:

• simple (e.g. VERSIONNUMBER)
• composite versioning (e.g. MAJOR.MINOR  or MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH)

Where to use it?

One or more increment-metadata macros can be put in a trigger macro.

The metadata value must have been already set e.g. at page creation using the set-metadata macro.

Parameters

Parameter	Required	Default	Notes
metadata name		none	The metadata item. The metadata item value is numeric and can be:  simple (e.g. whole number) composite (eg 2.1 or 2.1.1) A non-numerical character can be used to separate "-" the metadata numeric values e.g. 1__2-4. The separator can be any non-numeric character. A suffix may be used after the last numeric element e.g. 2.1.1-BETA. This can be any set of characters (including letters, symbols, and numbers).
increment		increment last numeric element by 1	The increment expression, if specified, is a numeric expression to increment element(s) of the numeric value. If no increment value is specified the last numeric element of the current metadata value is incremented by 1. The expression can be: a simple integer number (e.g. 2) composite number (e.g. 1.2  or 1.2.3) A composite number cannot be more than 3 numeric elements e.g. 1.2.3.4 is not supported. When defining the increment expression the format MUST match the metadata item value format including any separators and suffix identifiers. increment or a change for non-numeric elements is not supported. incrementing a single higher-order element of a composite numeric value will reset any lower-order elements to zero e.g. a metadata value of 1.2.3 with an increment expression of 1.0.0 will update the value to 2.0.0.

Increment expression examples

If the expression increments a single higher-order element of a composite numeric value the lower order element values are updated to zero

• e.g. incrementing the metadata value 1.1.4 using the increment expression 1.0.0 will result in the value being set to 2.0.0.

If the expression includes increments for each element of a composite numeric value each element is incremented by the appropriate value

• e.g. incrementing 1.1.4 using the increment expression 1.1.1 will result in the value being set to 2.2.5.

The increment expression format including any separator characters and the suffix identifier MUST match the metadata item value being incremented. 

An <empty> increment expression simply includes the name of the metadata value to increment.

{increment-metadata:my-version}

Simple Increment Example

{workflow:name=Simple Increment Metadata}
    {state:Draft|submit=Review}
    {state}
    {state:Review|approved=Approved}
        {approval:Review|assignable=true}
    {state}
    {state:Approved|final=true|submit=Draft}
    {state}
    {trigger:pagecreated}
        {set-metadata:my-version}
            0
        {set-metadata}
    {trigger}
    {trigger:statechanged|state=Approved}
        {increment-metadata:my-version}
    {trigger}
{workflow}

This example uses the increment-metadata macro to support the custom versioning of a page using a simple numeric metadata value.

The metadata name and initial value are set on the creation of the page using a trigger macro and the set-metadata action macro.

{set-metadata:my-version}0{set-metadata}

A version change will occur on a state change to the Approved state.

{increment-metadata:my-version}

 The metadata is associated with the page. At any one point in time, the metadata value will be the same in any workflow state.

• in our example, the my-version metadata value for a user viewing the content currently in a draft state (if that content has been previously published), is the value set by the increment-metadata action on the last transition to the workflow final state, Approved. It will be the same metadata value seen for the content by a view-only user when viewing the final state content

The Confluence version metadata value may be different if the page has been updated or edited in one of the workflow states.

In the simple increment example, this can be seen if you use one get-metadata macro to display the metadata my-version and a second  get-metadata macro to display the Confluence version on a page.

o

Add the page-activity macro to the page to see the workflow activity

• there has been only one approval event
• the metadata my-version value has only been incremented once
• the my-version value is 1

The Confluence version value is currently 9. This reflects that there have been multiple edits on the content but only one version has been approved in the workflow.

Other examples

• Page:
  Use metadata to increment a content version — Increment a composite version number for example, major.minor.patch metadata value each time a reviewer approves the content
• Page:
  Use metadata to increment composite major, minor, patch content version on an approval decision requiring a parameter — Use the {increment-metadata} macro to increment major.minor.patch metadata value for a single approval using three triggers.

 The metadata value set and updated using these macros is linked to the page not a page version. Viewing a previous page version will show the current metadata value.

See also

Workflow Authoring Guide:

• Notifications
• Events
• Triggers
• Actions