Release Notes for Curator Patch 3.5.2 changes 

Dec 2022

Process Engine (2.19.1.47) update replaces version 2.18

Version 2.19 with addition of new workflows will part form of the Curator 3.6 but is offered as accelerated release for Curator 3.5.1

This version can be standalone used with reminder of Curator 3.5.1, it does not contain any updated workflows. It offers SQS queue messaging (activity to post a string message onto a given AWS SQS queue). This release also offers further improvements and fixes including a rare race condition where a process never registers as complete

This version provides the following:

• Ability to cancel Device Director jobs.
• Activity specifically for making Curator API calls to Curator Gateway.
• Support for RabbitMQ messaging exchange.
• Updated versions of GhostScript (9.56.1 for Windows (64 bit)) and MediaInfo (v22.03) so these can be updated in Curator Installations. 
  NOTE: It is possible that other versions close to the above GhostScript version number will also function as expected, however, no other versions have been tested and verified to work with PE 2.19 other than version 9.25 for Windows (64 bit).
• Support for Public Service API v8.2.1 for Vidchecker.
• Extended support to send to more metadata supporting the Louise 1.6 API.

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Release Notes for Curator 3.5.1

Curator 3.5.1 introduces new features:

Completes migration of the Curator Clip Select capabilities to Curator Clip Link while improving the ease of use of these features. 
As a result, customers can withdraw the use of Curator Clip Select, replacing it with a faster and more intuitive Curator Clip Link, and will be able to improve the responsiveness of the system by removing Image Essences from the database (See Curator Server below).

Advanced Search and Saved Search are now available in Curator Clip Link, offering a new intuitive way of building metadata-specific searches with fully supported logical structure, user prompts for possible values, and highlighting of the search results to indicate why these are present in the results. For more information, please refer to the Advanced searching and saved searches in Curator article. 

Full Folder manipulation is now available in Curator Clip Link, including creating, deleting, moving and renaming. Manipulation of folders that involves moving high-level folders and changing their permissions (including cloning of user workgroups in Curator System Administrator) has been future-proofed so that it is scalable for large systems with deep folder paths and many workgroups.

Metadata display and entry of the values has been unified across the applications providing the same intuitive interface when configured during deployment as a metadata view or individual metadata layout. 

The controlled vocabulary use has been extended to support long lists of values and hierarchy where autocomplete is available to select from many values, and specific metadata can be declared to depend on the value selected previously for another metadata (e.g., selecting a continent to select countries from that continent). This requires the deployment of the Curator Logger for Hierarchical Metadata module. See the Metadata Central section below.

Proxy generation using XCode 4.1 improves efficiency by searching for the Alpha channel to render to the alpha proxy only if the Render Alpha has been requested in the Device Director profile.

The ability to maintain AWS S3 repositories has been further extended through the introduction of further VPC interface integration, the ability to set the AWS storage tier for an uploaded object, request a delete of the source file on completion, and move and copy multiple files within AWS S3 storage (see XFer below).

The following improvements have been introduced in Curator as of release 3.5.1 applications and services:

Curator Clip Link (3.4.1.97)

This release completes the migration of Curator Clip Select functionality into Curator Clip Link, including:

• A completely new advanced search and saved search GUI has been written from the ground up. 
  Note: Saving a search will save all search and filter configuration details present in the GUI. This includes all simple/regular search term(s), advanced search configuration, AI generated assets, filters and asset types to display, and the system / specific folder selected. Everything is saved as part of the "search".
  Note: All saved searches are visible to all users (though you can filter to display only your own), and only the user that created a saved search or an Administrator can delete them. Different users can create saved searches with the exact same name between them, but the same user cannot themselves save duplicate named saved searches.
• A new System Tree and an updated Asset List have been implemented, allowing for assets and folders to be dragged and dropped between the two and within themselves under the Folders tab 
  Note: You cannot drag assets from the Filters tab Asset List into the Folders tab System Tree. You can however cut and paste between the two as described in new right-click context menu functionality below.
• Thumbnails can now be set in the asset previewer. For sub-clips this can only be set within the limits of the start and end frames, and for bookmarks only on the bookmarked frame itself. This option is deactivated for Image type assets.
• New right-click context menu functionality (NOTE: this will only appear for relevant asset types):
  • Show asset locations - Opens a new bottom tab and displays the folder(s) and any collection(s) that the selected asset resides within.
  • Navigate to original folder - Navigates from assets presence in a collection to the original asset location.

Move Assets (under Folders tab) and Move folder acts like a "cut" option for assets (including folders), before "pasting" them with Place assets into the System Tree or Move to in the Asset List.  
Note: If you move an asset and then change the selected folder in the System Tree then you will no longer be able to place the assets. The contents of the "cut buffer" are lost when you change folders. You must therefore place the asset by either right-clicking the destination folder in the System Tree or else a child folder already visible in the Asset List.

• Various bug fixes
• UI/UX improvements including improved sorting and searching functionality for assets.

Curator Logger (2.4.1.23)

• The 2.4 release:
  • allows more efficient logging there is a widened ability to tab through fields in views. Some types of fields can now be tabbed through by default; these are 'text, 'text area' and 'autocomplete'.  All other types can now be configured by setting 'isFieldTab'.
  • when logging against multiple assets in succession, a lock option allows values to be retained for efficiency.  This is configured in the field by setting 'hasPersist', after which a padlock icon will appear in the field which the user can select to persist the values. Please remember that locking the dependent metadata field requires also locking the parent metadata, otherwise, the field will clear as it will not have the requirement of set parent fulfilled.
  • allows Mac Safari to use authentication-enabled API routing provided that already present in Curator Gateway 1.8 additional API route  /accesstoken/{accessToken}/proxies/{catchAll}  has been configured with the host details.
  • changes the keyboard shortcut for frame stepping to SHIFT + > or SHIFT + < to skip forward and backward through frames
  • fixes an occasionally observed issue where in-point setting was not obeyed resulting in the first frame being selected during save.
  • fixes GUI data-control issue loading metadata values and scroll-bar
  • encompasses hotfix issues present in Curator logger 2.3.1.67 including 
    • subclips are no longer duplicated when switching between assets, 
    • now correctly clearing values after save, 
    • with a value selected, the dropdown list for dependent metadata now displays options that correspond with that value, 
    • fixes the logging lock button behavior.
    • the Date Time picker issue has been fixed

Curator Connect (1.6.1.102 (Win) / 1.6.1.106 (Mac))

This version contains a Hotfix for a BoringSSL certificate expiry issue and multiple mezzanines for camera card functionality that builds upon the previous hot-fixes' ability to upload (and create appropriate side-car files with the source locations) mezzanine or hi-res source files.

Curator Gateway (1.8.1.28)

GUI improvements:

• Deactivated users will now be hidden by default with the ability to display these provided by a toggle
• The ability to delete users has been removed in order to maintain history and integrity
• API routes will now be sorted alphabetically

New functionality:

• The ability to obtain a user's avatar for possible future usage
• The ability for Curator Gateway to create the System Administrators group with a dynamic GUID if this does not already exist prior to configuring the email and password of the sysadmin user.
• A bug has also been fixed where a deactivated user requesting a password reset would result in a webpage error.

Metadata Central (2.2.1)

• This version extends the support for the Simple Metadata Hierarchy to multiple SKOS documents where the hierarchy is independent of others, improving the ability to log controlled vocabulary with multi-level hierarchy of descendants and now also with independent Topics which can be updated on regular bases.
• The 'document label' is now a compulsory part of the input and defines the Topic search space for descendants in the hierarchy. The list of available schemas for ingesting via ETL and the formats of the inputs is provided in the ETLSource.config file. The current list of schemas is:  smt, stats, ngss, optaf01, optaf40, ipvxmlv1, sportradarV1, warnermedia, ipvskosxmlv1; and the input formats are applicable to specific schemas.
• This release also moves the log file of the MDC Teragator to the familiar C:\ProgramData\IPV\Metadata Central Service\Logs directory in line with other Curator software.

Curator Server (4.1.1.207)

In this version:

• The database version is upgraded to to 3.1.0.0 and Solar core to curator_2_5, providing the minimum requirements for Curator Clip Link 3.4.1.89 and greater Advanced Search and Saved Search functionality.
• Out of the Box the CSA configuration schemas are provided: 
  • version 3.2.0.15 for IPV Curator For Adobe 3.3.1.43 (Win) \ 3.3.52 (Mac) and 
  • version 2.2.4 for Curator Connect 1.6.1.102 (Win) \ 1.6.1.106 (Mac)  

• Further metadata used by Process Engine workflows has been added into the Out of the Box deployment.
• Improvements are made to search functionality and performance on larger databases by fixing a few bugs and making efficiencies.
• Improvements are made for folder permission setting to scale up. This fixes issues with setting folder permissions, updating and moving folders, and cloning workgroups on sites where there are many workgroups and deep folder structures. An update is now securely saved to the database and then asynchronously propagates into the index using Delta index update.
• In order to preserve audit activity data, project, and other blob data history, users can no longer be deleted (they can still be deactivated).
• For improved security, the System Administrators' workgroup ID will now be set dynamically during deployment.
• The default retention time of unread messages on the RabbitMQ queues has been reduced, removing the need for manual changes to unused queues which were previously needed to limit RAM use.
• The /accesstoken/{accessToken}/proxies/{catchAll} API route will now be automatically added for secure Mac Safari HLS playback if not already present. Note that if this API route was not present and is added during the Curator Server upgrade then it must be manually configured in Curator Gateway to set the Downstream Host (FQDN).
• This release provides further helper scripts useful for maintenance during the upgrade, including the ability to:
  • give a chosen workgroup or all workgroups the read permissions to the static metadata - the system metadata required for the function of the Curator applications which error when these cannot be read. Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\GiveWorkgroupsReadPermissionOnAllStaticNames.sql
    Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\GiveAllWorkgroupsReadPermissionOnAllStaticNames.sql 
    This is required on older systems that do not have the All Users workgroup or where adding all users to the All Users workgroup is not practical.
  • remove duplicate Clipmarks 
    Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\SelectAndDeleteDuplicateClipmarks.sql 
    this can be conveniently applied during this upgrade as this script requires Solr reindex and this upgrade requires a reindex too.
  • select and delete orphaned Clipmarks 
    Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\SelectAndDeleteOrphanedClipmarks.sql
  • delete image essence is now also provided within the installed helper scripts: 
    Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\DeleteImageEssence.sql 
    This script can be used to reduce the size of the curatordb database where Clip Select is not in use.
  • reset name_id of the metadata where error "invalid metadata legacy id" has been seen. This is experienced on sites where very many metadata names have been created and deleted over time resulting in an error "invalid metadata legacy id" followed by a negative number, typically seen in CSA when attempting to add metadata to a view, use general helpers script to safely reset the name_ids of the metadata: 
    Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\ResetMetadataNameIds.sql 
  • In preparation of the introduction of shortcuts (asset references) likely in Curator 3.7, it is important to understand where early collections (scratchpads, productions) may have been created that carry true copies of assets with their own metadata, rather than linking to the original asset to set metadata there. A helper script is provided to assess the scale of the issue and to list the affected collections:  
    Curator\Server\Sql\Helpers\General\SelectScratchpadCopiesThatHaveTheirOwnMetadata.sql
• Further improvements and bug fixes are:
  • To avoid the inclusion of bad metadata, sports logging metadata must now include relevant content in order for it to be saved.
  • Required Client Credentials authentication has been added to the Process Engine Service client.
  • Thumbnails can now be added in SVG format.
  • A multiline textbox is now provided for the metadata Description.
  • Better defaults are now provided for Active Directory port when configuring an external provider.
  • Better stability during startup when a database schema check is being performed with mysqldump.
  • Release 4.1 also introduces most of the API required for the upcoming release of Curator System Administrator 2 with very much improved functionality around metadata names and views in particular as well as API required for asset shortcuts, the references to the asset from a set of additional folders, such as collections and productions. Fixes setting of blobs in a process authenticated using client credentials in preparation for the increased use of secure transactions.

XCode (4.1.1.21)

The 4.1 release changes slightly the 4.0 release functionality around its ability to decode the Alpha only from Apple ProRes 4444 HQ & XQ material. As of this release, for efficiency reasons, where ProRes 4444 with Alpha needs to be decoded, it is necessary to manually set a Control Switches value of renderalpha in the Device Director profile used (this will be HLS-FMP4-D1 by default). Please see First Time Setup page for the profile configuration. When this setting has been saved, subsequent transcoding should generate an alpha stream for any input format that carries alpha as part of the encoding (usually ProRes 4444). That alpha stream may be empty. For input formats incapable of carrying alpha, you should not get an output alpha stream. If the switch is not enabled, you will get a proxy but a separate alpha channel will not be generated.

When using the 4.1 XCode release, in order for HLS proxies to show the correct number of frames on output, you will need to disable edit lists by manually enabling the Control Switches value of disableqtelst in the Device Director profile used.

XFer (2.14.1.46)

This release provides:

• Additional support for AWS S3 VPC interface endpoints using Service URLs beyond that in the previous XFer 2.13.1.13 release
• Ability to set a delete source on completion option to Xfer AWS S3 DD jobs by adding the Property awss3.deleteSourceOnCompletion with value true, and the ability to set the storage tier for an object uploaded via a DD Xfer AWS S3 job by adding a Property for awss3.storageclass with any of the following values: STANDARD | REDUCED_REDUNDANCY | STANDARD_IA | ONEZONE_IA | INTELLIGENT_TIERING | GLACIER | GLACIER_IR | DEEP_ARCHIVE | OUTPOSTS (only if Outposts is configured as available in AWS)
• It is now also possible to copy/move multiple files at the same time (similar to BlackPearl) using a DD Job syntax of one file per line and a matching number of destination lines.

Device Director (5.18.1.72 as Hot Fix in Curator 3.4, 3.5)

An issue involving a race condition between submitting a job and clean-up tasks that could cause the monitor to stop monitoring (and therefore updating) jobs has been fixed.

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New System Deployment

Service and website prerequisites and installation guides can be found here for new deployments.

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Functionality Module Configuration

Additional steps which are optional as part of a Curator deployment, such as AWS AI integrations, Analytics, Archive, and Logging

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Upgrading

Guides for upgrading an existing Curator system are found here. 
These guides offer recommendations on how to take backups and install new services, along with required changes between versions.

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