diff --git a/config/alfresco/content-services-context.xml b/config/alfresco/content-services-context.xml
index 16fcea29aa..538c2de754 100644
--- a/config/alfresco/content-services-context.xml
+++ b/config/alfresco/content-services-context.xml
@@ -241,6 +241,13 @@
       </property>
    </bean>
    
+   <!-- Metadata Extraction Configuration -->
+   <bean id="metadataExtracterConfig" class="org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata.MetadataExtracterConfigImpl" >
+      <property name="properties">
+         <ref bean="global-properties" />
+      </property>
+   </bean>
+   
    <!-- Metadata Extraction Registry -->
    <bean id="metadataExtracterRegistry" class="org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata.MetadataExtracterRegistry" />
    
@@ -261,6 +268,9 @@
       <property name="properties">
          <ref bean="global-properties" />
       </property>
+      <property name="metadataExtracterConfig">
+         <ref bean="metadataExtracterConfig" />
+      </property>
    </bean>
    
    <!-- For coordination between OOoDirect and OOoJodconverter subsystems -->
@@ -466,6 +476,9 @@
          <value>true</value>
       </property>
        <property name="retryTransformOnDifferentMimeType" value="${content.transformer.retryOn.different.mimetype}"/>
+      <property name="metadataExtracterConfig">
+         <ref bean="metadataExtracterConfig" />
+      </property>
    </bean>
    
    <!-- Abstract bean definition defining base definition for all transformer that are not registered.
diff --git a/config/alfresco/rendition-services-context.xml b/config/alfresco/rendition-services-context.xml
index fcbad95505..df4f880012 100644
--- a/config/alfresco/rendition-services-context.xml
+++ b/config/alfresco/rendition-services-context.xml
@@ -175,6 +175,9 @@
       <property name="tikaConfig">
          <ref bean="tikaConfig"/>
       </property>
+      <property name="metadataExtracterConfig">
+         <ref bean="metadataExtracterConfig" />
+      </property>
    </bean>
 
    <bean id="compositeRenderingEngine"
diff --git a/config/alfresco/repository.properties b/config/alfresco/repository.properties
index 862afbbee3..2570dce626 100644
--- a/config/alfresco/repository.properties
+++ b/config/alfresco/repository.properties
@@ -650,6 +650,9 @@ content.transformer.Poi.poiExtractPropertiesOnly=true
 # The default timeout for metadata mapping extracters
 content.metadataExtracter.default.timeoutMs=20000
 
+# Indicates if the metadata extracter should parse shape objects inside open office files
+content.metadataExtracter.parseShapes=false
+
 # Property to enable upgrade from 2.1-A
 V2.1-A.fixes.to.schema=0
 #V2.1-A.fixes.to.schema=82
diff --git a/config/quick/dmsu1332-reproduced.xlsx b/config/quick/dmsu1332-reproduced.xlsx
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..51c1e5fb91
Binary files /dev/null and b/config/quick/dmsu1332-reproduced.xlsx differ
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter.java
index fccdfd04f7..b05c7066e4 100644
--- a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter.java
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter.java
@@ -148,6 +148,7 @@ abstract public class AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter implements MetadataExtrac
     private Properties properties;
     private Map<String, MetadataExtracterLimits> mimetypeLimits;
     private ExecutorService executorService;
+    protected MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig;
 
     /**
      * Default constructor.  If this is called, then {@link #isSupported(String)} should
@@ -417,7 +418,15 @@ abstract public class AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter implements MetadataExtrac
     {
         this.properties = properties;
     }
-
+    
+    /**
+     * The metadata extracter config.
+     */
+    public void setMetadataExtracterConfig(MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig)
+    {
+        this.metadataExtracterConfig = metadataExtracterConfig;
+    }
+    
     /**
      * Whether or not to enable the pass through of simple strings to cm:taggable tags
      * 
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMetadataExtracter.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMetadataExtracter.java
index 9c48a5185b..50944ed2de 100644
--- a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMetadataExtracter.java
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/AbstractMetadataExtracter.java
@@ -78,6 +78,7 @@ abstract public class AbstractMetadataExtracter implements MetadataExtracter, Be
     private long extractionTime;
     private String beanName;
     private Properties properties;
+    private MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig;
 
     protected AbstractMetadataExtracter(String supportedMimetype, double reliability, long extractionTime)
     {
@@ -131,7 +132,15 @@ abstract public class AbstractMetadataExtracter implements MetadataExtracter, Be
     {
         this.properties = properties;
     }
-
+    
+    /**
+     * The metadata extracter config.
+     */
+    public void setMetadataExtracterConfig(MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig)
+    {
+        this.metadataExtracterConfig = metadataExtracterConfig;
+    }
+    
     /**
      * @return Returns the mimetype helper
      */
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/MetadataExtracterConfig.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/MetadataExtracterConfig.java
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..8265744ec1
--- /dev/null
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/MetadataExtracterConfig.java
@@ -0,0 +1,43 @@
+/*
+ * Copyright (C) 2005-2016 Alfresco Software Limited.
+ *
+ * This file is part of Alfresco
+ *
+ * Alfresco is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
+ * it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by
+ * the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
+ * (at your option) any later version.
+ *
+ * Alfresco is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
+ * but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+ * MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
+ * GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.
+ *
+ * You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License
+ * along with Alfresco. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
+ */
+package org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata;
+
+import org.apache.tika.metadata.Metadata;
+
+/**
+ * Interface for allowing Alfresco to provide configuration properties to metadata extracters like
+ * Tika parser;
+ * 
+ * @author Andrei Rebegea
+ */
+public interface MetadataExtracterConfig
+{
+
+    // Users can specify override values in alfreso-global.properties
+    public static final boolean TIKA_PARSER_PARSE_SHAPES_DEFAULT_VALUE = false;
+
+    /**
+     * This method adds appropriate configuration values in the metadata map that will be used in
+     * Tika to control some of the features Tika has;
+     * 
+     * @param metadata
+     *            input/output map used by Tika to pass information about the file
+     */
+    void prepareMetadataWithConfigParams(Metadata metadata);
+}
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/MetadataExtracterConfigImpl.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/MetadataExtracterConfigImpl.java
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..fee37b69ee
--- /dev/null
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/MetadataExtracterConfigImpl.java
@@ -0,0 +1,78 @@
+/*
+ * Copyright (C) 2005-2016 Alfresco Software Limited.
+ *
+ * This file is part of Alfresco
+ *
+ * Alfresco is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
+ * it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by
+ * the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
+ * (at your option) any later version.
+ *
+ * Alfresco is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
+ * but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
+ * MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
+ * GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.
+ *
+ * You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License
+ * along with Alfresco. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.
+ */
+package org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata;
+
+import java.util.Properties;
+
+import org.apache.commons.logging.Log;
+import org.apache.commons.logging.LogFactory;
+import org.apache.tika.metadata.Metadata;
+import org.apache.tika.metadata.TikaMetadataKeys;
+
+/**
+ * Default implementation for the MetadataExtracterConfig;
+ * 
+ * @author Andrei Rebegea
+ */
+public class MetadataExtracterConfigImpl implements MetadataExtracterConfig
+{
+    protected static Log logger = LogFactory.getLog(MetadataExtracterConfigImpl.class);
+
+    private static final String PARSE_SHAPE_PROP_STRING = "content.metadataExtracter.parseShapes";
+
+    private Properties properties;
+
+    @Override
+    public void prepareMetadataWithConfigParams(Metadata metadata)
+    {
+        if (metadata == null)
+        {
+            return;
+        }
+        boolean shouldParseShapes = getBooleanProperty(PARSE_SHAPE_PROP_STRING, TIKA_PARSER_PARSE_SHAPES_DEFAULT_VALUE);
+        metadata.add(TikaMetadataKeys.TIKA_PARSER_PARSE_SHAPES_KEY, Boolean.toString(shouldParseShapes));
+        
+        if (logger.isDebugEnabled())
+        {
+            logger.debug("Tika metadata options passed to tika parser: " + metadata);
+        }
+    }
+
+    /**
+     * The Alfresco global properties.
+     */
+    public void setProperties(Properties properties)
+    {
+        this.properties = properties;
+    }
+
+    private boolean getBooleanProperty(String name, boolean defaultValue)
+    {
+        boolean value = defaultValue;
+        if (properties != null)
+        {
+            String property = properties.getProperty(name);
+            if (property != null)
+            {
+                value = property.trim().equalsIgnoreCase(Boolean.TRUE.toString());
+            }
+        }
+        return value;
+    }
+}
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaPoweredMetadataExtracter.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaPoweredMetadataExtracter.java
index 88231b80cb..db9f51ac47 100644
--- a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaPoweredMetadataExtracter.java
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaPoweredMetadataExtracter.java
@@ -379,7 +379,11 @@ public abstract class TikaPoweredMetadataExtracter
             
             Metadata metadata = new Metadata();
             metadata.add(Metadata.CONTENT_TYPE, reader.getMimetype());
-            
+            if (metadataExtracterConfig != null)
+            {
+               metadataExtracterConfig.prepareMetadataWithConfigParams(metadata);
+            }
+
             ParseContext context = buildParseContext(metadata, reader.getMimetype());
             
             ContentHandler handler;
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/AbstractContentTransformer2.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/AbstractContentTransformer2.java
index a6ff3964f8..820a60e7e7 100644
--- a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/AbstractContentTransformer2.java
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/AbstractContentTransformer2.java
@@ -40,6 +40,7 @@ import org.alfresco.repo.content.AbstractStreamAwareProxy;
 import org.alfresco.repo.content.StreamAwareContentReaderProxy;
 import org.alfresco.repo.content.StreamAwareContentWriterProxy;
 import org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata.AbstractMappingMetadataExtracter;
+import org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata.MetadataExtracterConfig;
 import org.alfresco.service.cmr.repository.ContentIOException;
 import org.alfresco.service.cmr.repository.ContentReader;
 import org.alfresco.service.cmr.repository.ContentServiceTransientException;
@@ -69,7 +70,7 @@ public abstract class AbstractContentTransformer2 extends AbstractContentTransfo
     private ContentTransformerRegistry registry;
     private boolean registerTransformer;
     private boolean retryTransformOnDifferentMimeType;
-
+    MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig;
     /**
      * A flag that indicates that the transformer should be started in it own Thread so
      * that it may be interrupted rather than using the timeout in the Reader.
@@ -110,8 +111,16 @@ public abstract class AbstractContentTransformer2 extends AbstractContentTransfo
     public void setRegistry(ContentTransformerRegistry registry)
     {
         this.registry = registry;
-    }    
-
+    }
+    
+    /**
+     * The metadata extracter config.
+     */
+    public void setMetadataExtracterConfig(MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig)
+    {
+        this.metadataExtracterConfig = metadataExtracterConfig;
+    }
+    
     /**
      * @param registerTransformer as been available for selection.
      *        If {@code false} this indicates that the transformer may only be
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/TikaPoweredContentTransformer.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/TikaPoweredContentTransformer.java
index 5f5b344335..12b877f774 100644
--- a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/TikaPoweredContentTransformer.java
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/content/transform/TikaPoweredContentTransformer.java
@@ -227,7 +227,11 @@ public abstract class TikaPoweredContentTransformer extends AbstractContentTrans
        
        Parser parser = getParser();
        Metadata metadata = new Metadata();
-       
+       if (metadataExtracterConfig != null)
+       {
+          metadataExtracterConfig.prepareMetadataWithConfigParams(metadata);
+       }
+
        ParseContext context = buildParseContext(metadata, targetMimeType, options);
        
        ContentHandler handler = getContentHandler(targetMimeType, ow);
diff --git a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/rendition/executer/HTMLRenderingEngine.java b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/rendition/executer/HTMLRenderingEngine.java
index c44d4e41ae..90536bb55a 100644
--- a/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/rendition/executer/HTMLRenderingEngine.java
+++ b/source/java/org/alfresco/repo/rendition/executer/HTMLRenderingEngine.java
@@ -45,6 +45,7 @@ import javax.xml.transform.stream.StreamResult;
 
 import org.alfresco.model.ContentModel;
 import org.alfresco.repo.action.ParameterDefinitionImpl;
+import org.alfresco.repo.content.metadata.MetadataExtracterConfig;
 import org.alfresco.repo.rendition.RenditionLocation;
 import org.alfresco.service.cmr.action.ParameterDefinition;
 import org.alfresco.service.cmr.dictionary.DataTypeDefinition;
@@ -88,7 +89,7 @@ public class HTMLRenderingEngine extends AbstractRenderingEngine
 {
     private static Log logger = LogFactory.getLog(HTMLRenderingEngine.class);
     private TikaConfig tikaConfig;
-    
+    private MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig;
     /**
      * This optional parameter, when set to true, causes only the
      *  contents of the HTML body to be written out as the rendition.
@@ -129,6 +130,14 @@ public class HTMLRenderingEngine extends AbstractRenderingEngine
         this.tikaConfig = tikaConfig;
     }
 
+    /**
+     * The metadata extracter config.
+     */
+    public void setMetadataExtracterConfig(MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig)
+    {
+        this.metadataExtracterConfig = metadataExtracterConfig;
+    }
+
     /*
      * (non-Javadoc)
      * @see org.alfresco.repo.rendition.executer.AbstractRenderingEngine#render(org.alfresco.repo.rendition.executer.AbstractRenderingEngine.RenderingContext)
@@ -350,6 +359,10 @@ public class HTMLRenderingEngine extends AbstractRenderingEngine
                    ContentModel.PROP_NAME
              ).toString()
        );
+       if (metadataExtracterConfig != null)
+       {
+          metadataExtracterConfig.prepareMetadataWithConfigParams(metadata);
+       }
        
        // Our parse context needs to extract images
        ParseContext parseContext = new ParseContext();
diff --git a/source/test-java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaAutoMetadataExtracterTest.java b/source/test-java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaAutoMetadataExtracterTest.java
index 69a468c1a4..6856e8ed74 100644
--- a/source/test-java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaAutoMetadataExtracterTest.java
+++ b/source/test-java/org/alfresco/repo/content/metadata/TikaAutoMetadataExtracterTest.java
@@ -78,6 +78,8 @@ public class TikaAutoMetadataExtracterTest extends AbstractMetadataExtracterTest
         TikaConfig config = (TikaConfig)ctx.getBean("tikaConfig");
         extracter = new TikaAutoMetadataExtracter(config);
         extracter.setDictionaryService(dictionaryService);
+        MetadataExtracterConfig metadataExtracterConfig = (MetadataExtracterConfig)ctx.getBean("metadataExtracterConfig");
+        extracter.setMetadataExtracterConfig(metadataExtracterConfig);
         extracter.register();
         
         // Attach some extra mappings, using the Tika
@@ -171,7 +173,62 @@ public class TikaAutoMetadataExtracterTest extends AbstractMetadataExtracterTest
            testFileSpecificMetadata(mimetype, properties);
         }
     }
-    
+
+    /**
+     * Test MNT-15219 Excel (.xlsx) containing xmls (shapes/drawings) with multi byte characters may
+     * cause OutOfMemory in Tika Note - doesn't use extractFromMimetype
+     */
+    public void testParsingOfShapesInXLSXFiles() throws Exception
+    {
+        AutoDetectParser ap = new AutoDetectParser();
+
+        String filename = "dmsu1332-reproduced.xlsx";
+        URL url = AbstractContentTransformerTest.class.getClassLoader().getResource("quick/" + filename);
+        File file = new File(url.getFile());
+
+        // Cheat and ask Tika for the mime type!
+        Metadata metadata = new Metadata();
+        metadata.set(Metadata.RESOURCE_NAME_KEY, filename);
+        MediaType mt = ap.getDetector().detect(TikaInputStream.get(file), metadata);
+        String mimetype = mt.toString();
+
+        if (logger.isDebugEnabled())
+        {
+            logger.debug("Detected mimetype " + mimetype + " for quick test file " + filename);
+        }
+
+        // Have it processed
+        // Note that if the patched/fix from MNT-15219 is not applied,
+        // or if the default false value of the content.metadataExtracter.parseShapes property is overridden
+        // then the next call will throw an OutOfMemory that is dealt with by the tika metadata extracter framework
+        // and it will fail at the next assert because properties extracted will be empty
+        Map<QName, Serializable> properties = extractFromFile(file, mimetype);
+
+        // check we got something
+        assertFalse("extractFromMimetype should return at least some properties, none found for " + mimetype + " - " + filename, 
+                properties.isEmpty());
+
+        if (properties.containsKey(ContentModel.PROP_AUTHOR))
+        {
+            assertEquals("Property " + ContentModel.PROP_AUTHOR + " not found for mimetype " + mimetype, 
+                    "Udintsev, Anton (external - Project)",
+                    DefaultTypeConverter.INSTANCE.convert(String.class, properties.get(ContentModel.PROP_AUTHOR)));
+        }
+        else
+        {
+            fail("Expected one property out of " + ContentModel.PROP_CREATOR + " and " + ContentModel.PROP_AUTHOR + " but found neither of them for "
+                    + mimetype);
+        }
+
+        // Ensure that we can also get things which are standard
+        // Tika metadata properties, if we so choose to
+        assertTrue("Test Property " + TIKA_MIMETYPE_TEST_PROPERTY + " not found for mimetype " + mimetype, 
+                properties.containsKey(TIKA_MIMETYPE_TEST_PROPERTY));
+        assertEquals("Test Property " + TIKA_MIMETYPE_TEST_PROPERTY + " incorrect for mimetype " + mimetype, 
+                mimetype,
+                DefaultTypeConverter.INSTANCE.convert(String.class, properties.get(TIKA_MIMETYPE_TEST_PROPERTY)));
+    }
+
     @Override
     protected boolean skipAuthorCheck(String mimetype) { return true; }