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1.1       harris41    1: This is a pilot release of the NSDL-LONCAPA Gateway.
                      2: 
                      3: The goal
                      4: ========
                      5: Implement a metadata exchange of resources from
                      6: NSDL (http://www.smete.org) to LON-CAPA (http://www.lon-capa.org)
                      7: and vice versa.
                      8: 
                      9: More information is in the doc/ directory.
                     10: 
                     11: What's new
                     12: ==========
                     13: For a history of this software, you should work through
                     14: the CVS repository.
                     15: 
                     16: export CVSROOT=:pserver:USERNAME@install.lon-capa.org:/home/cvs
1.2       harris41   17: cvs login
                     18: cvs co nsdl
1.1       harris41   19: 
                     20: How to build and install
                     21: ========================
                     22: 
                     23: cd nsdl/build
                     24: make build
                     25: make install
1.2       harris41   26: 
                     27: Important files
                     28: ===============
1.4       harris41   29: To get a good overview on the metadata conversion, I recommend
                     30: you look at the nsdl/prototypes/metadata_convert.pl script
1.5     ! harris41   31: (perldoc ./metadata_convert.pl).  Among other things, this
1.4       harris41   32: provides a list regarding the crosswalk possibilities of
                     33: LON-CAPA to&from IEEE-LOM and LON-CAPA to&from Dublin Core.
                     34: 
                     35: Currenty, the four stylesheets for carrying out the metadata conversion are:
                     36: * nsdl/lib/stylesheets/dcnsdl_to_loncapa.xsl
                     37: * nsdl/lib/stylesheets/lomnsdl_to_loncapa.xsl
                     38: * nsdl/lib/stylesheets/loncapa_to_dcnsdl.xsl
                     39: * nsdl/lib/stylesheets/loncapa_to_lomnsdl.xsl
1.2       harris41   40: 
                     41: The Apache web handler modules are defined in the directory:
                     42: nsdl/lib/perl/Apache/  .
                     43: 
                     44: The Apache configuration file (see below also) is
                     45: nsdl/conf/nsdl.conf  .
                     46: 
1.4       harris41   47: The source-to-target information is defined by nsdl/build/gatewayfiles.lpml
1.3       harris41   48: (an XML file defines how the software is "rendered" onto the system).
1.4       harris41   49: gatewayfiles.lpml is used in many locations inside nsdl/build/Makefile.
1.2       harris41   50: 
                     51: And, there are other files.
1.1       harris41   52: 
                     53: System requirements
                     54: ===================
                     55: * Apache and mod_perl
                     56: * Graham Barr's TimeDate module (http://search.cpan.org/search?dist=TimeDate)
                     57: * XML::Xalan perl module (http://search.cpan.org/search?dist=XML-Xalan)
                     58: 
                     59: To configure your machine, you will need to add the following
                     60: line to your /etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf file.
                     61: 
                     62:   Include conf/nsdl.conf
                     63: 
                     64: (You will then need to restart your web server;
                     65:  /etc/rc.d/init.d/httpd restart)
                     66: 
                     67: Issues
                     68: ======
                     69: This is a pilot effort.  The goal was to enact a reasonable
                     70: solution and directly uncover difficult issues.
                     71: 
                     72: Here are some of the remaining issues
                     73: * ISSUE: User authentication
                     74:   PROBLEM: users are crossing domains, so browser-cookie validation can't work
                     75:   SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS: should require a GPG public key and/or
                     76:                        servers should communicate to coordinate passing of user
                     77:                        and/or some kind of proxy or central verification system
                     78: * ISSUE: Imperfect metadata cross-walking
                     79:   PROBLEM: There are a range of imperfect mappings between Dublin Core and
                     80:            LON-CAPA metadata fields as well as between IEEE LOM and LON-CAPA
                     81:            metadata fields.
                     82:   SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS: Improve the LON-CAPA metadata that is collected and
                     83:                        place more importance on the exhaustive IEEE LOM
                     84:                        standard rather than the weaker Dublin Core standard.
                     85:                        In the future, to get to Dublin Core, it might make
1.4       harris41   86:                        sense to first convert LON-CAPA to IEEE LOM and *then*
                     87:                        go to the Dublin Core metadata standard.
1.1       harris41   88: * ISSUE: Set hierarchies
                     89:   PROBLEM: Asking for ListIdentifiers from LON-CAPA will return a really long
                     90:            list that represents a "jumbled" repository.  Currently,
                     91:            ListIdentifiers, ListRecords, etc return error messages--
                     92:            we do not yet support set hierarchy results.
                     93:   SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS: authors should be able to nominate their records
                     94:                        for being part of a meaningful collection of academic
                     95:                        resources; thus multiple OAI-distributed metadata sets
                     96:                        would actually be contained within LON-CAPA
                     97: * ISSUE: Code thoroughness
                     98:   PROBLEM: Limited time.  I had limited time (100 hours) to enact a gateway.
                     99:   SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS: Invest more time.  The API and documentation
                    100:                        could be a better match for what is implemented
                    101:                        and vice versa.
                    102: * ISSUE: Making SMETE available to LON-CAPA
                    103:   PROBLEM: Ummm... I thought SMETE supported OAI.  The only interface I find
                    104:            is enriched HTML forms.
                    105:   SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS: SMETE should support OAI or some exporting of XML files
                    106:                        in Dublin Core or IEEE LOM or whatever they are using.
                    107: 
                    108: Author
                    109: ======
                    110: Scott Harrison, 2002