Introduction to Content Models

Content models are used in Flowable Work or Engage to define a type for uploading of a document or other file type. Content models can also be used to define a versioning scheme, or define metadata values, or define the type or state values for the content item. Content models are deployed on the Content engine, and they follow the same deployment and definition pattern like other Engines, for example, Process definitions in the BPMN engine or Action definitions in the Action engine. Like other definition types, the key value of a content model is important, because that uniquely identifies a content definition within the Content engine. When a content definition already exists with a key that is specified for a new content deployment, a new version of the existing content definition is created, and the new deployment is the most recent content definition.

In addition to the regular content metadata like file name, name, file size, date created, created by etc. values, the Content engine supports adding custom metadata values as well. The definition of these metadata values are part of the content model and are defined with a form. When there is, for example, a need to store metadata values like policy name and document number, a form with two text fields can be created that have a policy name and document number text field. The content model then references this form and when deployed to the Content engine, these metadata values can be edited by the user when a content item is connected to this content model.