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There are certain types of associations that should have properties (attributes). I could not see a way to add attributes/properties to an association. Can you please confirm?
Associations cannot have any attributes.This is different to a graph database, say like Neo4J, which can have labels / attributes on relations. But you can always model a two-step association using an intermediary object / node to hold the attributes.
There are always ways to model around the constraint but this comes at a cost. If we have large structures to manage with association attributes one could well get into a performance issues.
Fundamentally not sure why the notion of "qualified associations - associations with properties (attributes and associations)" are not supported. If Alfresco is used as a platform for many industry solutions then the need to provide such support will be there.
From my experience of close to 8 years working with Alfresco, associations with properties are rarely relevant in an ECM / DMS scenario. Only if you try to create a graph-like database would you need that, and in that case it is typically considered a bad practice to try this. Alfresco simply is not meant to be used like a graph database.
I agree that modelling associations with properties in the way I mentioned does not scale very well. It only is an option for small / controlled use cases.
Thanks for responding Axel.
Content could mean different things to different companies. I am not looking at content only in terms of Document and file folders. Hence the need for qualified associations. If this is a limitation what is the procedure to request an enhancement from Alfresco? The Alfresco framework is quite solid but support to have properties (attributes and associations) on associations will have a positive impact on its potential use beyond small use cases.
Hi Axel,
Looks like there is no response to the project I created. Can you please send an email to yogish.kode@tripudiotech.com? I would like to talk to you directly about some of the questions I have.
Regards,
