Documentation Campaign Campaign v8 Documentation

Schema structure schema-structure

Last update: Tue Aug 20 2024 00:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

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The basic structure of an <srcschema> is as follows:


<srcSchema>
    <enumeration>
        ...          //definition of enumerations
    </enumeration>

    <element>         //definition of the root <element>    (mandatory)

        <compute-string/>  //definition of a compute-string
        <key>
            ...        //definition of keys
        </key>
        <sysFilter>
            ...           //definition of filters
        </sysFilter>
        <attribute>
            ...             //definition of fields
        </attribute>

            <element>           //definition of sub-<element>
                  <attribute>           //(collection, links or XML)
                  ...                         //and additional fields
                  </attribute>
                ...
            </element>

    </element>

        <methods>                 //definition of SOAP methods
            <method>
                ...
            </method>
            ...
    </methods>

</srcSchema>

The XML document of a data schema must contain the <srcschema> root element with the name and namespace attributes to populate the schema name and its namespace.

<srcSchema name="schema_name" namespace="namespace">
...
</srcSchema>

Let us use the following XML content to illustrate the structure of a data schema:

<recipient email="John.doe@aol.com" created="AAAA/DD/MM" gender="1">
  <location city="London"/>
</recipient>

With its corresponding data schema:

<srcSchema name="recipient" namespace="cus">
  <element name="recipient">
    <attribute name="email"/>
    <attribute name="created"/>
    <attribute name="gender"/>
    <element name="location">
      <attribute name="city"/>
   </element>
  </element>
</srcSchema>

Description description

The point of entry of the schema is its main element. It is easy to identify because it has the same name as the schema, and it should be the child of the root element. The description of the content begins with this element.

In our example, the main element is represented by the following line:

<element name="recipient">

The elements <attribute> and <element> that follow the main element enable you to define the locations and names of the data items in the XML structure.

In our sample schema, these are:

<attribute name="email"/>
<attribute name="created"/>
<attribute name="gender"/>
<element name="location">
  <attribute name="city"/>
</element>

The following rules must be adhered to:

Each <element> and <attribute> must be identified by name via the name attribute.

note caution
CAUTION
The name of the element should be concise, preferably in English, and include only authorized characters in accordance with XML naming rules.

Only <element> elements can contain <attribute> elements and <element> elements in the XML structure.
An <attribute> element must have a unique name within an <element>.
The use of <elements> in multi-line data strings is recommended.

Data types data-types

The data type is entered via the type attribute in the <attribute> and <element> elements.

A detailed list is available in Campaign Classic v7 documentation.

When this attribute is not populated, string is the default data type unless the element contains child elements. If it does, it is used only to structure the elements hierarchically (<location> element in our example).

The following data types are supported in schemas:

string: character string. Examples: a first name, a town, etc.

The size can be specified via the length attribute (optional, default value “255”).
boolean: Boolean field. Example of possible values: true/false, 0/1, yes/no, etc.
byte, short, long: integers (1 byte, 2 bytes, 4 bytes). Examples: an age, an account number, a number of points, etc.
double: double-precision floating point number. Examples: a price, a rate, etc.
date, datetime: dates and dates + times. Examples: a birth date, a purchase date, etc.
datetimenotz: date + time without time zone data.
timespan: durations. Example: seniority.
memo: long text fields (multiple lines). Examples: a description, a comment, etc.

uuid: “uniqueidentifier” fields

note note
NOTE
To contain a uuid field, the “newuuid()” function must be added and completed with its default value.

Here is our example schema with the types entered:

<srcSchema name="recipient" namespace="cus">
  <element name="recipient">
    <attribute name="email" type="string" length="80"/>
    <attribute name="created" type="datetime"/>
    <attribute name="gender" type="byte"/>
    <element name="location">
      <attribute name="city" type="string" length="50"/>
   </element>
  </element>
</srcSchema>

Properties properties

The <elements> and <attributes> elemtns of the data schema can be enriched with various properties. You can populate a label in order to describe the current element.

Labels and descriptions labels-and-descriptions

The label property lets you enter a brief description.

note note
NOTE
The label is associated with the current language of the instance.

Example:

code language-none
`<attribute name="email" type="string" length="80" label="Email"/>`

The label can be seen from the Adobe Campaign client console input form:

The desc property lets you enter a long description.

The description can be seen from the input form in the status bar of the Adobe Campaign client console main window.

note note
NOTE
The description is associated with the current language of the instance.

Example:

code language-none
`<attribute name="email" type="string" length="80" label="Email" desc="Email of recipient"/>`

Default values default-values

The default property lets you define an expression returning a default value on content creation.

The value must be an expression compliant with XPath language. For more on this, refer to this section.

Example:

Current date: default=“GetDate()”

Counter: default=“‘FRM’+CounterValue(‘myCounter’)”

In this example, the default value is constructed using the concatenation of a string and calling the CounterValue function with a free counter name. The number returned is incremented by one at each insertion.

note note
NOTE
In the Adobe Campaign client console, the Administration>Counters node is used to manage counters.

To link a default value to a field, you can use the <default> or <sqldefault> field. </sqldefault> </default>

<default>: allows you to pre-fill the field with a default value when creating entities. The value will not be a default SQL value.

<sqldefault>: allows you have an added value when creating a field. This value appears as an SQL result. During a schema update, only the new records will be impacted by this value.

Enumerations enumerations

Free enumeration free-enumeration

The userEnum property lets you define a free enumeration to memorize and display the values entered via this field. The syntax is as follows:

userEnum=“name of enumeration”

The name given to the enumeration can be chosen freely and shared with other fields.

These values are shown in a drop-down list from the input form:

NOTE

In the Adobe Campaign client console, the Administration > Enumerations node is used to manage enumerations.

Set enumeration set-enumeration

The enum property lets you define a fixed enumeration used when the list of possible values is known in advance.

The enum attribute refers to the definition of an enumeration class populated in the schema outside the main element.

Enumerations allow the user to select a value from a drop-down list instead of entering the value in a regular input field:

Example of an enumeration declaration in the data schema:

<enumeration name="gender" basetype="byte" default="0">
  <value name="unknown" label="Not specified" value="0"/>
  <value name="male" label="male" value="1"/>
  <value name="female" label="female" value="2"/>
</enumeration>

An enumeration is declared outside the main element via the <enumeration> element.

The enumeration properties are as follows:

baseType: type of data associated with the values,
label: description of the enumeration,
name: name of the enumeration,
default: default value of the enumeration.

The enumeration values are declared in the <value> element with the following attributes:

name: name of the value stored internally,
label: label displayed via the graphical interface.

dbenum enumeration dbenum-enumeration

The dbenum property lets you define an enumeration whose properties are similar to those of the enum property.

However, the name attribute does not store the value internally, it stores a code which lets you extend the concerned tables without modifying their schema.

The values are defined via the Administration>Enumerations node.

This enumeration is used for specifying the nature of campaigns, for example.

Example example

Here is our example schema with the properties filled in:

<srcSchema name="recipient" namespace="cus">
  <enumeration name="gender" basetype="byte">
    <value name="unknown" label="Not specified" value="0"/>
    <value name="male" label="male" value="1"/>
    <value name="female" label="female" value="2"/>
  </enumeration>

  <element name="recipient">
    <attribute name="email" type="string" length="80" label="Email" desc="Email of recipient"/>
    <attribute name="created" type="datetime" label="Date of creation" default="GetDate()"/>
    <attribute name="gender" type="byte" label="gender" enum="gender"/>
    <element name="location" label="Location">
      <attribute name="city" type="string" length="50" label="City" userEnum="city"/>
   </element>
  </element>
</srcSchema>

Collections collections

A collection is a list of elements with the same name and the same hierarchical level.

The unbound attribute with the value “true” lets you populate a collection element.

Example: definition of the <group> collection element in the schema.

<element name="group" unbound="true" label="List of groups">
  <attribute name="label" type="string" label="Label"/>
</element>

With projection of the XML content:

<group label="Group1"/>
<group label="Group2"/>

Reference with XPath reference-with-xpath

The XPath language is used in Adobe Campaign to reference an element or attribute belonging to a data schema.

XPath is a syntax that lets you locate a node in the tree of an XML document.

Elements are designated by their name, and attributes are designated by the name preceded by the character “@”.

Example:

@email: selects the email,
location/@city: selects the “city” attribute under the <location> element
…/@email: selects the e-mail address from the parent element of the current element
group[1]/@label: selects the “label” attribute that is the child of the first <group> collection element
group[@label='test1']: selects the “label” attribute that is the child of the <group> element and contains the value “test1”

NOTE

An additional constraint is added when the path crosses a sub-element. In this case, the following expression must be placed between brackets:

location/@city is not valid; please use [location/@city]
[@email] and @email are equivalent

It is also possible to define complex expressions, such as the following arithmetic operations:

@gender+1: adds 1 to the content of the gender attribute,
@email + ‘(’+@created+‘)’: constructs a string by taking the value of the e-mail address added to the creation date between parentheses (for the string type, put the constant in quotes).

High-level functions have been added to the expressions in order to enrich the potential of this language.

You can access the list of available functions via any expression editor in the Adobe Campaign client console:

Example:

GetDate(): returns the current date
Year(@created): returns the year of the date contained in the “created” attribute.
GetEmailDomain(@email): returns the domain of the e-mail address.

Building a string via the compute string building-a-string-via-the-compute-string

A Compute string is an XPath expression used to construct a string representing a record in a table associated with the schema. Compute string is mainly used in the graphical interface to display the label of a selected record.

The Compute string is defined via the <compute-string> element under the main element of the data schema. An expr attribute contains an XPath expression to calculate the display.

Example: compute string of the recipient table.

<srcSchema name="recipient" namespace="nms">
  <element name="recipient">
    <compute-string expr="@lastName + ' ' + @firstName +' (' + @email + ')' "/>
    ...
  </element>
</srcSchema>

Result of the computed string for a recipient: Doe John (john.doe@aol.com)

NOTE

If the schema does not contain a Compute string, a Compute string is populated by default with the values of the primary key of the schema.

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