RetrieveHistory API question

[ismangil]

On Vault 3.5.1, can someone explain to me the interaction between req.DateFilterMask = VaultQueryRequestDates.HistoryBefore | VaultQueryRequestDates.HistoryAfter;

and BeginDate and EndDate?

I looked at cmdline.cs in the api package but couldn't really understand it.

My most frequent history request are: range of exact dates and all existing history.

[jclausius]

The Client API uses a Date filter floor, ceiling, or both (a range). The filter mask takes an OR'ed int for the different kinds of filters. For example, in your example, it is using BOTH HistoryAFTER and HistoryBEFORE to get a range of dates.

If you want to do no date filtering, leave these members with their default values.

[ismangil]

Can you elaborate on the concept of "date filtering"?

Why would one want after, before, both, or none?

[jclausius]

It is easier to explain this by looking at the Vault client.

Do a Show History on a file or folder, and look at the "Dates & Labels" tab. The different Date options on that dialog are what is available in the API.

[ismangil]

I guess what I am asking is why the need for a datefilter at all.

Isn't begindate and enddate enough info? That is all history request is always for a range: begindate=empty enddate=some date will mean anything up to that date, begindate=some date enddate=empty will mean from that date onwards, both empty I guess will mean enddate=now.

Thanks for the taking the time to explain this to me Jeff, I know this is fairly esoteric, however I found in all cases our custom tools really depends on correct and precise history retrieval (which from a plugin does not always happen but that's for another thread...).

[jclausius]

Since you need both just set the DateFilterMask.