The Picturepark Content Platform is released in its newest version.

• Version: Piz Linard Release (10.7)
• Date: 5-September-2020 (TBC)
• Platform: {name}.picturepark.com

Main changes:

• Search suggestions with auto-completion.
• XMP/EXIF metadata read/write mappings.
• Configurable sortable fields in the Content Browser.

The current Picturepark release is Piz Linard, selected in a poll, with a vote share of around 48% from Picturepark staff. Piz Linard is a pyramid-shaped mountain with its highest peak at 3,410 m in the Silvretta mountain range. It was first climbed on August 1st, 1835, by the geologist and naturalist Oswald Heer. He might have enjoyed managing the flora of Switzerland within Picturepark, having all families, types and genus in connected lists with additional attributes, while putting together his work “Flora tertiaria Helvetiae”.

Release Summary

Notable changes include:

• XMP/EXIF metadata is written from files to Picturepark metadata fields. All metadata from Picturepark, including tagging information, can be written back into files when downloaded, based on mapping rules defined for file types that support XMP metadata.
• Search suggestions for the Content Browser and List Browser facilitate users to find what they are looking for. Suggestions are based on filter configurations per Channel.
• Configurable sortable fields in browser views “List” or “Thumbnails”, that were previously hard-coded and non-editable, are made available.
• The group mapping for federated users now permits roles to be added in Picturepark, independent from the Active Directory user groups, improving flexibility in permission management.
  
• When viewing Shares, users can not see all shared metadata layers and other information in the share viewer.
• Transfer improvements for the stability of uploading/importing files to Picturepark have been made.

Release Details

XMP/EXIF Metadata Read/Write Mappings

When importing files into Picturepark or exporting from Picturepark, we support extraction (previously already supported), importing XMP/EXIF data into Picturepark metadata fields (new) and exporting data from Picturepark metadata fields into XMP (new) based on field mappings.

These mappings enable admins to select mapping direction (XMP to Metadata, Metadata to XMP, or Both), the XMP field (Dublin Core, IPTC, and others), and the corresponding metadata field in Picturepark. Priority defines in which order multiple values are written into the same field (separated by comma). The stop switch prevents that after the first value is added, additional values are written if they exist for the same field.

These mappings now enable you to map all desired XMP metadata values to Picturepark metadata fields, where you can review, edit, update or remove the metadata values - all without using Business Rules.

As a sample: You can add the Dublin Core subject keywords as tags to your keyword list. You can write the rights information traveling with your file, to your Copyright field in Picturepark to ensure the correct copyrights are applied when the press, partners, or users download the file again. You can save your verified metadata back to the file on download to ensure users of the file understand the context of what is shown.

Search Suggestions

The Picturepark Search now provides users with search suggestions, a feature that auto-completes terms while typing. The search suggestions are listed based on matching Content or List Items in Picturepark. The list is ordered by the number of Content Items found for the search query, also shown when hovering an item.

The data used for the suggestions are defined via Channel filters for the Content Browser and List filters for its List Item Browser and the corresponding search fields added per filter. The functionality is similar to the search inside the filters but applied to all available filters of the specific channel.

The search modes of Picturepark (AND, OR, Advanced) are also listed in the new suggestions panel with additional information provided via tooltips.

There is a limitation with regard to word stems. It is currently not possible to find terms by trailing word stems: e.g. “berry” will not find “strawberry”. Nevertheless, all translations will be considered for searching. Therefore “Erdbeere” will find “Strawberry”, and vice versa.

Assign Roles to Federated Users Independently

Group mappings for federated authentication have been extended with the Piz Linard release. Now, additional roles can be assigned to users in Picturepark - in addition to the ones defined via user group mappings with the federating Identity Provider. Previously all additional role assignments made within Picturepark had been reset when federated users logged in, so as to only keep the Identity Provider provided roles in effect.

With this feature you can leverage the benefits of both worlds: you map your Identity Provider as a trusted source so that all users get access to Picturepark. You also define group mappings based on your setup in the Active Directory (1), e.g. based on departments so that all Marketing users will get access to Picturpark as editors, whereas sales will only get read access.

Using Picturepark’s inbuilt role assignments (2) you can then separate the Marketing users by giving experienced users advanced permissions, without asking your IT department for additional Active Directory groups and user assignments. Still, your IT department has full control over general access to the platform, to restrict access for leaving employees or separating partners.

The roles assigned via IdP group mappings (1) can only be updated in the IdP settings, whereas the manual assigned roles (2) can be updated in the user management settings in Picturepark. Federated users who are changed to Picturepark managed users will keep all role assignments, which can then be updated in the Picturepark user management settings.

Content Browser Custom Sort Fields

The Picturepark Content Browser now supports channel-specific sorting in addition to the already available channel-specific filters.

The default sort options (Creation date, Modification date, Relevance, and Filename) are always added as default for Channel creation via UI and can be removed or replaced with more suitable options.

Sample: A product channel may benefit from sorting by release date, product price, market, or campaigns, whereas an event channel benefits more from sorting based on location, event date, and sponsors.

Display of Selected Metadata For Shares

The metadata applied to Content Items can be selected when creating a share, and is then shared too. This shared metadata will now be displayed in the share viewer to recipients and others who access it.

The Layers selected in the share creation will be displayed as metadata panels. Keywords and tags will be displayed as links with all additional metadata available in the card detail (see screenshot). This way, the recipients benefit from all related metadata information of smart tags in Picturepark - directly when accessing the shared metadata.

Various Other Changes & Improvements

This section lists additional improvements and notable changes in this release.

For Users

• Picturepark Search:
  • The search modes have been renamed to AND, OR, and Advanced which gives some better insights on how the search is executed.
• Content Browser / List Browser:
  • The selected filter item in the filter stays in its place and is no longer added to the top. The jumping of filter items was confusing and has been removed in this release.
  • The scrolling in filters removed for selecting “show more” or “show less” and users don’t lose their position.
  • A dedicated metadata field for the original file creation date is introduced for content migrated to Picturepark via API, which must be configured for the customer's Picturepark.
• User Profile:
  • Users find a new button “Reset settings” in the user profile allowing them to reset Picturepark specific settings in the application e.g. display of messages for batch editing or import, searches, filters. Session information is not reset.
• Signup:
  • A captcha is displayed on signup which users have to complete in order to sign up for the Picturepark.

For Editors

• Lists:
  • The sort settings defined for a list are used as the default sort criteria for values in a tagbox connected to this list. When the user starts typing, the sort is switched back to relevance (best match).
• Batch Editor:
  • Layers with required fieldset fields and relationship fields can no longer be added to multiple items in the Batch Editor, as editing those fields is not supported in the batch editor. Users have to select single items and add the desired layer one-by-one.
• Content Picker/Content Portal:
  • Support for adding multiple Content Items to the basket with one click. This functionality is known from the Content Browser and has now been added to the Content Portal.

For Admins

• User Management:
  • Improved message for user deactivation requests to inform the user managers (all users with access to user management) about the need to transfer their content.
  • Certain user attributes are prevented from updates: Email address for non-federated users, and email, first name, last name, and the address for federated users. This latter change was made because these attributes are automatically synchronized with the federated IdP.
• Fields:
  • Translated Text fields will change the default analyzer from simple to language when the field is included in the search. This way, text is correctly analyzed for the Picturepark Search.
  • Date Time fields have a new option that enables you to add the current date-time when creating new items with the field or updating existing items with a Layer with such a field. Admins can still choose to not prefill the current date and add a custom date as before.
  • The original file creation date can now be added as a creation date into the activity panel for content migrated onto Picturepark via API.
• Display Pattern:
  • A field with the name size used in the Display Pattern was converted to the character size and not recognized as the field value. Therefore size is now added as indexer: [size] automatically in the Display Pattern Editor.

API Breaks

Changes to System Requirements or Limitations

• Imports of files with a file path longer than 260 characters are not supported. A list of files that cannot be uploaded is shown to the user. The file path for those files must be shortened before upload.
• Files with empty filenames in transfers are ignored in the upload process and skipped from the transfer.

Known Issues

Here is a list of known issues that users should be aware of when using the Content Platform. If you encounter any other issues than those listed below, then please contact Picturepark Support.

• The Content Browser filter for file types shows jpg and JPG (in capitals) as two filters.
• Scrolling using the mouse is sometimes not possible in dropdown selections e.g. to select permission set or user role.
• In Picturepark in the share browser, Virtual Item thumbnails are not correctly displayed. Also shares with long titles are not correctly displayed in the list view.
• Channel: For customers with huge amounts of data and indexed metadata, the filters may show the approximate amount of items and not the total amount. The Content Browser shows the correct count. This error is an ElasticSearch error on bucket count. The numbers can be corrected by reducing the splitting of data to ElasticSearch shards but the shard reduction can only be done by Picturepark, as the option to update the numbers yourself has been removed with this release.
• It is possible to create a filter in the Content Browser with the ID "language" but the filter will not display correctly in the Content Browser. Avoid the creation of filters with ID language.
• In the status menu, the button to trigger a reindex is overlapped by the notification panel.

Bug Fixes

Select bug-fixes are listed below:

• Fields
  • The Fieldset value display is now limited to the component width before it was causing horizontal scrolling.
  • Hyphenation in multiline fields was fixed. Prior to this release, words were broken without hyphens making text hard to read or understand.
• Filters
  • Filters are passed from the Content Browser to Excel Roundtripping App or Shares. Those filters were sometimes not applicable to the new location. Filters are now applied correctly or removed when switching menu items.
• Batch Editor/Field Configuration
  • When marking words, holding the left mouse, and moving, the user accidentally switched tabs. This behavior was removed as in the batch editor or field configuration, the tab switch was not desired.
  • Editors with only view permissions on schemas couldn’t make changes to other schemas they were permitted to when view-only schemas were visible. The unchanged schemas were considered and prevented changes to the changed schemas.
• Permissions
  • The Add Button for adding permissions on schemas has been removed for users not able to add permissions.
  • German translations were not displayed correctly.
• Display Pattern
  • The preview in the Display Pattern Editor is now refreshed correctly after changes. Previously it was only refreshed if an item was selected for preview.
• Output formats
  • Dynamic formats were not displayed correctly for download after creation. A fix is implemented.
  • Watermark actions can now be applied to original, previews, or other temporary output formats. Previously watermark action could only be applied to the original.
• Schemas
  • After deletion of fieldset or relationship schema the user was not redirected to the schema browser but stayed in the detail view of the deleted item.
  • The link in the detail panel of a layer inside a list (“used in layer”) redirects the user to lists instead of layer (wrong URL path).
  • The layer selection now displayed the correct layers for the assignment. Previously layers assigned and unassigned were not displayed until a browser refresh.
  • Multiselect for List Items now working as expected. Previously only text was highlighted but List Items were not selected.
• Import
  • XMP metadata for files containing multiple XMP metadata blocks are now correctly extracted.
• Share
  • Batch deletion of shares now possible with appropriate permissions. Previously batch share deletion was restricted to owners.
• Display Pattern
  • Re-rendering of a Display Pattern with an invalid Display Pattern template is now correctly logged as an error and traced. Previously the rendering couldn’t finish and was displayed as ‘in progress’.