ApplyMetadataTemplate behaving oddly - dropping existing metadata fields and not adding fields defined in template

Report · Dec 10, 2015

This is my first post to this forum, and first I wish to thank those who provided code snippets to help folks. That also helped me tremendously in getting started with Bridge scripting when documentation was deficient. I have been struggling for days trying to figure out why my script did not update metadata correctly, then narrowed down to some odd behaviors (perhaps it only behaves as I instructed it to do).

0. In Bridge, create a template to add common metadata info such as author info, copyright

1. In Bridge script: Update metadata of an image - event location, headlines etc.; then

2. ApplyMetadataTemplate (append) to the same image to add common fields such as author info and copyright;

Result: Fields added in step 1 were wiped out; some fields identified in the template were added (creator, copyright status and usage terms), but some did not make it (creator state/country/email/website). I had expected that metadata added before applyMetadataTemplate/append would be retained, and all fields specified in the applied template would show up.

I would appreciate any help to show me where I went wrong. Below is a code snippet that illustrates the problem, followed by a diff of metadata dumps before/after ApplyMetadataTemplate command. The test environment: Windows 10, CS6.

var image = "C:/_testBridge/test1.jpg";

var thb = new Thumbnail(image);

var md = thb.synchronousMetadata;

if (!ExternalObject.AdobeXMPScript) ExternalObject.AdobeXMPScript = new ExternalObject('lib:AdobeXMPScript');

var xmpf = new XMPFile(File(image).fsName, XMPConst.UNKNOWN, XMPConst.OPEN_FOR_UPDATE);

var xmp = xmpf.getXMP();

xmp.setProperty(XMPConst.NS_PHOTOSHOP, "City", 'myCity');

xmp.setProperty(XMPConst.NS_PHOTOSHOP, "State", 'myState');

xmp.setProperty(XMPConst.NS_PHOTOSHOP, "Country", 'myCountry');

xmp.deleteProperty(XMPConst.NS_DC, "description");

xmp.appendArrayItem(XMPConst.NS_DC, "description", 'myDescription', 0, XMPConst.PROP_IS_ARRAY);

xmp.setQualifier(XMPConst.NS_DC, "description[1]", XMPConst.NS_XML, "lang", "x-default");

if (xmpf.canPutXMP(xmp)) {

xmpf.putXMP(xmp);

var xmpObjectInfo = Array;

xmpObjectInfo = xmp.dumpObject();

$.writeln('Applied event metadata to: ', image);

$.writeln(xmpObjectInfo);

}

xmpf.closeFile(XMPConst.CLOSE_UPDATE_SAFELY);

//append additional common metadata -author information and copyright

md.applyMetadataTemplate('Test', "append");

var xmpf2 = new XMPFile(File(image).fsName, XMPConst.UNKNOWN, XMPConst.OPEN_FOR_READ);

var xmp2 = xmpf2.getXMP();

xmpObjectInfo = xmp2.dumpObject();

$.writeln('AfterApplyMetadataTemplate-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------');

$.writeln(xmpObjectInfo);

xmpf2.closeFile(XMPConst.CLOSE_UPDATE_SAFELY);

Diff result: Fields dropped are highlighted in red; fields added by ApplyMetadataTemplate are highlighted in Green. A large section of the data is omitted.

 Dumping XMPMeta object "" (0x0)
   aux: http://ns.adobe.com/exif/1.0/aux/ (0x80000000 : schema)
   xmp:ModifyDate = "2015-04-19T13:44:15.00"
   xmp:CreateDate = "2015-04-19T13:44:15.00"
-  xmp:MetadataDate = "2015-12-08T15:46:42-08:00"
+  xmp:MetadataDate = "2015-12-10T20:05:51-08:00"
   photoshop: http://ns.adobe.com/photoshop/1.0/ (0x80000000 : schema)
   photoshop:DateCreated = "2015-04-19T13:44:15.00"
   photoshop:Instructions = "Post"
-  photoshop:City = "myCity"
-  photoshop:State = "myState"
-  photoshop:Country = "myCountry"
   xmpMM: http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/mm/ (0x80000000 : schema)
   xmpMM:DocumentID = "4FD08D9FEEAAA7FE028B9B7E24CB5925"
 ...
   dc: http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/ (0x80000000 : schema)
   dc:format = "image/jpeg"
-   dc:description  (0x200 : isArray)
+   dc:creator  (0x600 : isOrdered isArray)
-  [1] = "myDescription" (0x50 : hasLang hasQual)
+  [1] = "Author name field"
-  ? xml:lang = "x-default" (0x20 : isQual)
   xmpRights: http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/rights/ (0x80000000 : schema)
   xmpRights:Marked = "True"
   xmpRights:UsageTerms (0x1E00 : isLangAlt isAlt isOrdered isArray)
   [1] = "Usage terms" (0x50 : hasLang hasQual)
   ? xml:lang = "x-default" (0x20 : isQual)