[GeoNetwork-devel] Versioning in GeoNetwork 3

GeoNetwork GeoNetwork Developer
1

Hi all,

I was looking into versioning on GeoNetwork on our 3.4.4 instance, but the documentation is pretty scarce. I was hoping someone on the mailing list might be able to comment on any of my observations or offer suggestions…

  1. Records have a 'start versioning" button, but it has no tactile or textual feedback, so it’s hard for me to tell when hitting that button has done anything. This seems like it might be a bug, since I’ve seen “click and spin” applied as an attribute to the logo.

  2. The “versioning” page under ‘admin console’ → ‘statistics and status’ only seems to list file additions and file deletions. I was expecting versioning to track file changes as well? From the feature request for versioning, there’s even an example of file changes - https://trac.osgeo.org/geonetwork/wiki/metadatachanges

  3. I’ve even dug into the Subversion server via command line and svn commands, but I can’t seem to find any more file version information - but I literally only started using subversion yesterday so I am likely to be missing or overlooking something. For example, I started versioning on a file, made multiple changes to it, then deleted it… but svn only shows two revisions - the addition of the file and its deletion.

  4. There are two experimental versioning API calls. One seems to be for a single record, while the other seems to be for multiple records. Is there any other difference between these calls? And if they’re experimental - what should I be on the lookout for, with respect to problems or issues? (Basically - what might go wrong with these experimental API calls?)

  5. Followup from 4 - the /records/UUID/versioning command documentation on Swagger UI seems out of date, since it says a successful response is HTTP code 200, but it looks like it’s actually a code 201.

  6. Even if a record is versioned, the “versioning” page only lists the original title - if the title is changed, it can be hard to link back to the correct record. This feels like a bug?

  7. The original feature request for versioning said this was done on a record-by-record basis due to performance costs. Are these performance costs still around in version 3.4.4? I would imagine they are, but am unsure if anyone has looked into it or if changes were made from the original feature request.
    Anyways - apologies for the long list of questions and bug reports. I’m hopeful someone might have some insight or feedback on some of these.

Thanks in advance,

Kim

···

MERIDIAN on blue circle containing many numbers, with an orange wave pulse to the right.

Kim Mortimer

Data Manager

MERIDIAN - Marine Environmental Research Infrastructure for Data Integration and Application Network

Institute for Big Data Analytics, Faculty of Computer Sciences, Dalhousie University

p: + 1 902 494 1812 m: +1 902 880 1863

a: 6050 University Ave, Halifax, NS, B3H 4R2, Canada

w: https://meridian.cs.dal.ca e: k.mortimer@anonymised.com
2

Hi Kim,

have you enabled the VCS versioning system in the catalogue settings? You can find it in the Admin Console → Settings → Metadata → Enable VCS (Once enabled, VCS is using SVN tool to follow metadata changes. This feature is experimental. It is also not operational on NFS filesystem. Once enabled, the application needs a restart.)

image.png

Regards,
Juan Luis.

···


Vriendelijke groeten / Kind regards,

Juan Luis Rodríguez.


Veenderweg 13
6721 WD Bennekom
The Netherlands
T: +31 (0)318 416664

Please consider the environment before printing this email.

3

Hi Juan,

I do not see that setting on our GeoNetwork catalog.

I’ve followed Admin Console → Settings, then from the main settings tab scrolled down to the Metadata section, but there is no subsection there titled “Version Control System”.

However, in System Settings → Catalog description, there is an SVN ID assigned to our GeoNetwork and I’ve confirmed some elements of that Subversion repository appear to be working - as noted in my original email.

We are currently running GeoNetwork version 3.4.4, so I wonder if this setting is from a different version?

Kim

(attachments)

image.png

···

From: Juan Luis Rodríguez Ponce juanluisrp@anonymised.com
Sent: 11 August 2019 09:11
To: Kim Mortimer K.Mortimer@anonymised.com
Cc: geonetwork-devel@lists.sourceforge.net geonetwork-devel@anonymised.coms.sourceforge.net
Subject: Re: [GeoNetwork-devel] Versioning in GeoNetwork 3

Hi Kim,

have you enabled the VCS versioning system in the catalogue settings? You can find it in the Admin Console → Settings → Metadata → Enable VCS (Once enabled, VCS is using SVN tool to follow metadata changes. This feature is experimental. It is also not operational on NFS filesystem. Once enabled, the application needs a restart.)

image.png

Regards,
Juan Luis.

On Fri, Aug 9, 2019 at 7:51 PM Kim Mortimer <K.Mortimer@anonymised.com> wrote:

Hi all,

I was looking into versioning on GeoNetwork on our 3.4.4 instance, but the documentation is pretty scarce. I was hoping someone on the mailing list might be able to comment on any of my observations or offer suggestions…

  1. Records have a 'start versioning" button, but it has no tactile or textual feedback, so it’s hard for me to tell when hitting that button has done anything. This seems like it might be a bug, since I’ve seen “click and spin” applied as an attribute to the logo.

  2. The “versioning” page under ‘admin console’ → ‘statistics and status’ only seems to list file additions and file deletions. I was expecting versioning to track file changes as well? From the feature request for versioning, there’s even an example of file changes - https://trac.osgeo.org/geonetwork/wiki/metadatachanges

  3. I’ve even dug into the Subversion server via command line and svn commands, but I can’t seem to find any more file version information - but I literally only started using subversion yesterday so I am likely to be missing or overlooking something. For example, I started versioning on a file, made multiple changes to it, then deleted it… but svn only shows two revisions - the addition of the file and its deletion.

  4. There are two experimental versioning API calls. One seems to be for a single record, while the other seems to be for multiple records. Is there any other difference between these calls? And if they’re experimental - what should I be on the lookout for, with respect to problems or issues? (Basically - what might go wrong with these experimental API calls?)

  5. Followup from 4 - the /records/UUID/versioning command documentation on Swagger UI seems out of date, since it says a successful response is HTTP code 200, but it looks like it’s actually a code 201.

  6. Even if a record is versioned, the “versioning” page only lists the original title - if the title is changed, it can be hard to link back to the correct record. This feels like a bug?

  7. The original feature request for versioning said this was done on a record-by-record basis due to performance costs. Are these performance costs still around in version 3.4.4? I would imagine they are, but am unsure if anyone has looked into it or if changes were made from the original feature request.
    Anyways - apologies for the long list of questions and bug reports. I’m hopeful someone might have some insight or feedback on some of these.

Thanks in advance,

Kim

MERIDIAN on blue circle containing many numbers, with an orange wave pulse to the right.

Kim Mortimer

Data Manager

MERIDIAN - Marine Environmental Research Infrastructure for Data Integration and Application Network

Institute for Big Data Analytics, Faculty of Computer Sciences, Dalhousie University

p: + 1 902 494 1812 m: +1 902 880 1863

a: 6050 University Ave, Halifax, NS, B3H 4R2, Canada

w: https://meridian.cs.dal.ca e: k.mortimer@anonymised.com

GeoNetwork-devel mailing list
GeoNetwork-devel@lists.sourceforge.net
https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/geonetwork-devel
GeoNetwork OpenSource is maintained at http://sourceforge.net/projects/geonetwork

–


Vriendelijke groeten / Kind regards,

Juan Luis Rodríguez.


Veenderweg 13
6721 WD Bennekom
The Netherlands
T: +31 (0)318 416664

Please consider the environment before printing this email.