Ant Migration Tool Guide
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Describing Metadata Types
The describeMetadata target returns a list of metadata types that are enabled for your organization. This target is useful when you want to identify the syntax needed for a metadata type in a <name> element in package.xml; for example, CustomObject for custom objects or Layout for page layouts. The following parameters may be set for each <sf:describeMetadata> target:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| username | Required if sessionId isn’t specified. The Salesforce username used for login. The username associated with this connection must have the Modify Metadata through Metadata API Functions permission. |
| password | Required if sessionId isn’t specified. The password you use to log in to the organization associated with this project. If you are using a security token, paste the 25-digit token value to the end of your password. |
| sessionId | Required if username and password aren’t specified. The ID of an active Salesforce session or the OAuth access token. A session is created after a user logs in to Salesforce successfully with a username and password. Use a session ID for logging in to an existing session instead of creating a new session. Alternatively, use an access token for OAuth authentication. For more information, see Authenticating Apps with OAuth in the Salesforce Help. |
| serverurl | Optional. The Salesforce server URL (if blank, defaults to login.salesforce.com). To connect to a sandbox instance, change this value to test.salesforce.com. |
| apiVersion | Optional. The API version to use for the metadata. The default is 64.0. |
| resultFilePath | Optional. The path of the output file where results are stored. The default output is the console. Directing the output to a file makes it easier to extract the relevant information for your package.xml manifest file. |
| trace | Optional. Defaults to false. Prints the SOAP requests and responses to the console. This option shows the user’s password in plain text during login. |
To get the list of metadata types enabled for your organization, specify a target in the build.xml file using <sf:describeMetadata>.
1<target name="describeMetadata">
2 <sf:describeMetadata
3 username="${sf.username}"
4 password="${sf.password}"
5 sessionId="${sf.sessionId}"
6 serverurl="${sf.serverurl}"
7 resultFilePath="describeMetadata/describe.log"/>
8</target>