Discuss ADR: Media Manager Architecture

[JamesHabben]

Media Manager Implementation Discussion

We're proposing a new Media Management System to centralize and streamline how we handle media files across different modules in our project. This issue is to discuss the proposed architecture and technical specifications.

Key Points:

1. Centralized media check-in process
2. Avoidance of duplicate media entries
3. Automatic reference tracking
4. Integration with existing parser systems

Proposed Changes:

1. New check_in_media function that modules will use to register media files
2. New database tables: media_items and media_references
3. Modules will store MediaReference objects as cell values
4. Updates to automatic parsers in ilapfuncs.py and lavafuncs.py to handle MediaReference objects

Documents for Review:

• Media Management Technical Specification
• Media Management Architecture Decision Record

Questions for Discussion:

1. Is the proposed check_in_media function signature sufficient? Should we add or remove any parameters?
2. Are there any concerns about performance, especially for projects with a large number of media files?
3. How should we handle cases where the same media file is referenced by multiple modules or artifacts?
4. Are there any additional metadata fields we should consider extracting and storing?
5. How should we approach implementing the automatic parser updates in ilapfuncs.py and lavafuncs.py?

Please review the linked documents and share your thoughts, concerns, or suggestions.

[abrignoni]

Per discussion on another platform:

• The check_in_media function will add the metadata as stated in the documents for review into a data structure that LAVA will use in order to display the media and the metadata to the user.
• Refactoring of module code will be minimal so far as long as the HTML output is still used. This we hope will not be a long time.
• The seeker functions in the LEAPP will need to be refactored considerably in order to add this new functionality in a way that is transparent to the module developer.
• The data directory in the LEAPP report folder will be the ultimate repository of all data to include media. This will provide consistency across all reporting sources be it zip, tar, or from a directory in the file system.

[abrignoni]

Some of my thoughts on the questions:

1. Any metadata we can pull from files we should. I agree on EXIF data as soon as feasible.
2. As discussed previously the app loading items as they are being accessed is a key feature of this reporting system.
3. The LAVA database will have the paths for each file it needs to show module table. As the user moves from module to module in LAVA the tool will just use the reference. The metadata will be on the media/file data structure.