DASe — Digital Archive Systems and Exchange
============================================

DASe is a web-based digital collections management and repository system
for storing, organizing, browsing, and exposing digital objects and their
metadata through a web interface and REST API.

Originally developed at The University of Texas at Austin.


OVERVIEW
--------
DASe allows institutions or individuals to:

  - Manage digital collections with hierarchical organization
  - Create and edit items with customizable metadata (attributes, item types)
  - Upload and manage media files (images, audio, video, documents)
  - Search and browse collections via database queries or Apache Solr
  - Expose collections via REST API (Atom Publishing Protocol, JSON, XML)
  - Control access with user roles and visibility levels
  - Tag and categorize items


TECH STACK
----------
  - Language:    PHP 5.x (custom MVC framework, no external PHP frameworks)
  - Database:    MySQL, PostgreSQL, or SQLite (via PDO)
  - Search:      Apache Solr 2.2+ (optional; falls back to database search)
  - Templating:  Smarty (with Django-style template inheritance)
  - Cache:       File-based (or memcached)
  - API formats: Atom/APP, JSON, XML, CSV
  - Frontend:    jQuery + custom CSS/JS
  - Media:       ImageMagick (thumbnails), getid3 (audio metadata)


DIRECTORY STRUCTURE
-------------------
  index.php         Application entry point
  inc/              Bootstrap, configuration files
  lib/              Core framework (Dase PHP classes)
    Dase.php          Main application class
    Dase/
      Handler.php     Base REST handler with routing logic
      DBO.php         ORM base class (database abstraction)
      DB.php          PDO database wrapper
      Config.php      Configuration manager
      Solr.php        Apache Solr integration
      Atom.php        Atom Publishing Protocol support
      Template.php    Smarty template wrapper
      Http/           HTTP request/response classes
      DBO/            Data objects (Item, Collection, User, Media, Tag, etc.)
      Handler/        REST endpoint handlers (23 handlers)
  modules/          Optional plugin modules
    install/          Web-based installation wizard
    admin/            Admin panel
    audio/            Audio-specific features
    dbadmin/          Database administration
    google/           Google API integrations
    local/            Local customizations
    uteid/            UT EID institutional login integration
  templates/        Smarty HTML templates (layout, collections, items, etc.)
  bin/              Command-line maintenance and admin scripts (~31 scripts)
    solr_index.php    Index items into Solr
    build_json.php    Generate JSON documents from items
    migrate_collection.php  Migrate data between systems
  www/              Static web assets (CSS, JavaScript, images)
  files/            Runtime directory (writable by web server)
    media/            Uploaded media file storage
    log/              Application logs
    cache/            Smarty template cache
  framework_setup/  Boilerplate for creating custom DASe-based applications
  solr_schema.xml   Apache Solr field definitions


REQUEST FLOW
------------
  1. index.php loads inc/bootstrap.php (config, autoloader, constants)
  2. Dase::run() initializes DB, parses HTTP request
  3. URI template matching routes to appropriate Handler subclass
  4. Handler method queries DBO objects (ORM layer) against database
  5. Response rendered as HTML (Smarty), JSON, Atom, or XML


INSTALLATION
------------
  1. Place the 'dase' directory inside your web server docroot.

  2. Edit .htaccess and set RewriteBase to match the URL path.
     Example: if accessible at http://example.com/dase, set:
       RewriteBase /dase

  3. Create an empty MySQL (or PostgreSQL) database.

  4. Make the dase/files directory writable by the web server:
       chmod -R 775 dase/files
       chown -R www-data:www-data dase/files

  5. Open a browser and navigate to the dase directory.
     The installation wizard will guide you through database setup
     and creating the initial admin user.


REQUIREMENTS
------------
  - Apache with mod_rewrite enabled
  - PHP 5.x+ with PDO extension
  - MySQL 5.x, PostgreSQL, or SQLite
  - ImageMagick (convert binary) for image thumbnails
  - Apache Solr 2.2+ (optional, for full-text search)


CONFIGURATION
-------------
  inc/config.php        Default settings (do not edit directly)
  inc/local_config.php  Local overrides — set database credentials,
                        paths, site title, and other options here.

  Key settings in local_config.php:
    $conf['db']['type']          // mysql, sqlite, or pgsql
    $conf['db']['host']          // database host
    $conf['db']['name']          // database name
    $conf['db']['user']          // database username
    $conf['db']['pass']          // database password
    $conf['app']['main_title']   // site title shown in UI
    $conf['app']['media_dir']    // path to writable media storage
    $conf['search']['engine']    // 'db' or 'solr'
    $conf['app']['convert']      // path to ImageMagick convert binary
    $conf['auth']['superuser']   // admin username
    $conf['auth']['service_token'] // API access token


API
---
DASe exposes collections and items via REST using Atom Publishing Protocol.
Resources are available in multiple formats by appending an extension:

  /collection/{id}          HTML view
  /collection/{id}.json     JSON format
  /collection/{id}.atom     Atom feed
  /collection/{id}/item/{n} Individual item (also available as .json, .atom)

Authentication uses HTTP Basic Auth or a service token for API access.