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.

For example, the macro is used to increment a metadata value for a custom version:

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

increment-metadata macro is available from v6.11+

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

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. For example

incrementing the metadata value 1.1.4 using the increment expression 1.0.0 results 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. For example

incrementing 1.1.4 using the increment expression 1.1.1 results 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.

Metadata Value	Increment Expression	Resulting Value

Metadata Value	Increment Expression	Resulting Value
1	<empty>	2
1.0	<empty>	1.1
1.0	0.1	1.1
1.0	1.0	2.0
3.5.1	<empty>	3.5.2
3.5.1	0.0.1	3.5.2
3.5.1	0.2.0	3.7.0
3.5.1	0.2.1	3.7.2
3.5.1	1.0.0	4.0.0
3.5.1	1.1.1	4.6.2
3.5.1-Beta	1.0.0-Beta	4.0.0-Beta

An <empty> increment expression only 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 occurs on a state change to the Approved state using a trigger with the following action macro

{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 is 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 differ if the page has been updated or edited in one of the workflow states.

This occurs in the simple increment example, when using

one get-metadata macro to display the metadata my-version
a second get-metadata macro to display the Confluence version on a page

The page-activity macro (or document activity macro) added to the page displays the workflow events and actions. In our example

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.

Setting metadata when using a content label filter workflow

Other examples

A metadata value is linked to a page not a page version. Viewing a previous page version shows the current metadata value.

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.