About MIME types

Some Content Engine objects have an associated Multipurpose Internet Mail Extension (MIME) type. MIME is a standard protocol for identifying the data type of a file. For a Content Engine object, the MIME type identifies the type of content that is associated with the object. The MIME type allows you to manually or programmatically determine the appropriate application for displaying or editing the content. You can also use the MIME type of a newly added document as a means for automatically selecting a class for the document. For information about document classification, see Automatic document classification.

The following objects have an associated MIME type:

After you check in a document, you cannot change the value of any MIME type property associated with the document. Specifically, the Content Type and MIME Type properties become read-only on the following objects: the checked-in document, any annotations associated with the document, and any content elements that belong to the document or associated annotations. Conversely, before or during document check in, you can assign a MIME type to those objects. An explicit MIME type assignment prevents or overrides the default MIME type assignment performed by either Content Engine or Enterprise Manager. For information about changing MIME types on document checkin, see Check in content window. For information about viewing the MIME type of content elements, see Document properties (Content Elements tab).

Content Engine default MIME type assignment

When you check in a document, Content Engine potentially assigns a default MIME type to the following objects:

No default MIME type is assigned to content reference elements. Document checkin fails with an error if the document has one or more content reference elements with no MIME type.

As discussed in this section, Content Engine potentially assigns a default MIME type to a document, annotation, or content transfer element. Before document checkin, an application can also potentially assign a MIME type. From an application point of view, these application-supplied MIME types are default MIME types. Specify the MIME type directly to avoid the possibility of Content Engine or an application assigning an incorrect MIME type by default. (The application in question might be a FileNet tool such as Enterprise Manager or any custom application.)

Enterprise Manager default MIME type assignment

When you use the Create New Document wizard, Enterprise Manager potentially assigns default MIME types to the following objects: