Conveniently copy properties from one asset to another to ensure consistency across multiple assets.

Introduction

Asset properties can be any kind of information on an asset, such as name, creation date and workflows or dimensions and color of a product asset. Asset properties often need to be edited, for instance, when you have to add the color and size for all products of a specific product family.

Benefit

Copying properties can be important when keeping assets consistent that need to share the same set of properties. For instance, to keep asset properties consistent inside a product family you can copy them from an already existing asset to a new one. Or, you might want to ensure that all product assets across several product categories share a certain set of features. In these cases, censhare takes you step-by-step through the selection process of which properties to copy or even add to an asset.

censhare allows for any properties to be copied between any asset and asset type freely so that you can make use of this functionality according to your needs. Of course, it makes sense to select reasonable combinations of properties and asset types for copying, for instance copying the properties resolution and size from an asset of type image to another asset of the same type.

Prerequisites

The properties available to be copied depend on your censhare configuration and on the selected asset type. Properties with hierarchical child properties cannot be copied.

General workflow

You start the copying process by selecting the target asset the properties should be copied to. A wizard takes you through the workflow in three steps.

In step 1, you select the source asset from which you want to pick the properties.

In step 2 of the wizard, you decide which properties you need or want to copy. The available properties are sorted in dialog groups. Property groups bundle properties that are convenient to be copied together. For instance, a group “Workflow” may contain the properties workflow, workflow step and workflow target. Open each of the groups and check which features are provided.

In step 3 of the wizard, you select the properties and values to be copied based on the selected dialog groups. To help select the appropriate values, a property overview is displayed. It shows the property values currently assigned to the source asset and whether these properties are already set for the target asset.

In step 3 of the wizard, on the "Select properties" (1) page, the source property values (2) are displayed. (3) indicates, if these properties are already set for the target asset. To copy any values or properties, check the boxes (4) to the right.

Detailed workflow

To copy the properties of one asset to another asset, follow these steps:

  1. Open the asset you want the properties to be copied to. The asset page is displayed. This is your target asset.

  2. From the asset page of the target asset, open the asset page Actions menu and select "Copy properties from". A wizard guides you through the next steps.

  3. On the "Choose source asset" page, select the asset from which the properties should be picked. This is your source asset. Confirm with NEXT.

  4. On the "Choose dialog groups" page, the groups containing the available properties for copying are displayed in alphabetical order. You can change the list view to your needs by clicking the Views button. To decide which properties to copy, use the Open action of the respective group asset and check which properties are provided.

    Double-clicking will bring you to step 3 of the wizard.
    The way the properties are grouped depends on your censhare configuration. If no source asset properties can be found in any of the dialog groups, no content is displayed when double-clicking it and a respective message is shown. In this case, you do not need to select an “empty” dialog group, as there are no source properties to copy and none of the properties summed up in this dialog group are displayed in step 3 of the wizard when selecting properties.

  5. Once you have decided, go back with PREVIOUS to the “Choose dialog group” page of the wizard. Select the dialog groups containing the properties you want to copy and confirm with NEXT.

  6. On the "Select properties page", a list of source asset properties and property values is displayed based on the selected dialog group(s). Only those values are displayed which are available in the source asset. If, for example, any dialog group contains five properties and only three values are available for the source asset, then only those three values are displayed in step 3 of the wizard, on the "Select properties page". The missing values for the two properties are not reflected in step 3 of the wizard. So, only those values which are available in source asset can be copied to or overwritten in the target asset.

  7. If a property is already set for the target asset, a marked check box “Existing value” is displayed next to it. For properties that have not been set for the target asset before, the “Existing value” hint is missing. Check the list to decide which properties and values to copy.

  8. To select the properties that you need or want to copy, check the boxes to the right of the respective entries. You can copy the existing values and any property displayed. If you click the checkbox in the headline, all entries are selected.

  9. Click DONE to confirm your actions.

Result

The selected properties and property values are copied to the target asset.