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#
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#  '$RCSfile$'
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#   '$Author: jones $'
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# '$Revision: 1295 $'
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#     '$Date: 2002-08-16 01:51:57 -0700 (Fri, 16 Aug 2002) $'
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#
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Metacat: XML Metadata Database
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------------------------------
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Version: 1.1.0 Release
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Send feedback and bugs to: metacat-dev@ecoinformatics.org
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                           http://bugzilla.ecoinformatics.org
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Contributors: Matt Jones (jones@nceas.ucsb.edu)
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              Chad Berkley (berkley@nceas.ucsb.edu)
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              Jing Tao (tao@nceas.ucsb.edu)
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              Jivka Bojilova (bojilova@nceas.ucsb.edu)
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              Dan Higgins (higgins@nceas.ucsb.edu)
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Metacat is a flexible database storage system for XML formatted
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documents. Metacat models the structure of the XML document, therefore
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allowing storage of XML documents with arbitrary schemas. Metacat supports
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several databases on the back-end, including Oracle, PostgeSQL and SQL Server.
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The server supports XML document
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storage, retrievel, query, validation, and transformation (using the XSLT
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stylesheet language).  In addition, there is a mechanism for replicating
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the database to other metacat instances for backup and load balancing
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purposes.  Metacat currently uses an LDAP database for authenticating
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users, but was written to accomodate other authentication services as well.
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Release Notes
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-------------
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  New features in 1.1.0:
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  1) Added functionality to export a zipped data package. The zip file contains
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     all of the data and metadata as well as a rendered html summary of
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     the metadata.
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  2) Changed version control mechanism.  Metacat can now accept any version of 
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     a document as long as the given version number is greater than the
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     current one.  The new version number does not have to be exactly one
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     greater than the current version.
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  3) Update xerces.jar file to version 1.4.4
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  Fixes in 1.1.0
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   1) Fixed ldap authentication bug.  Now, a user from a referred server cannot
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      login with an incorrect password.
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   2) Changed the default behavior of the access control functionality with 
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      respect to packaging.
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      If a member document in a data package doesn't have an access control list, 
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      access control rules of the main package document will not apply to the 
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      member document.  Previously, package members, by default, inherited
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      the access control rules of the main package document.
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   3) Fixed minor bugs with document access control.
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   4) Allowed new version of data files to be uploaded and handled.
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   5) Fixed bug where the client could not get the principals or groups from 
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      the ldap server.
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  Fixes in 1.0.3
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   1) Fixed problem with Metacat not being able to query for group names when
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      and LDAP referral server was down.  Added an LDAP timeout of 5 seconds
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      for all referral activity.
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   2) Fixed problem where invalid xml characters such as ampersands (&) could
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      be inserted into the resultset xml stream.  
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  Fixes in 1.0.2
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   1) Fixed problem with LDAP locking up Metacat when a referral server
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      was not available.
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  Fixes in 1.0.1
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   1) Fixed problem with authenticating using LDAP referrals
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   2) Fixed bug that prevent groups from being used in access documents
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Installation
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------------
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See the file "docs/user/metacatinstall.html" for detailed instructions.
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Documentation
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-------------
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See the docs directory for detailed documentation and installation 
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instructions.
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Details of the Metacat architecture can be found on the website for 
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the Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity (KNB):
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  http://knb.ecoinformatics.org/software/metacat/
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Contributions to this work are welcome.  Please see the above web site
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for details on how to contribute.
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Major Known Bugs or Feature Requests (see http://bugzilla.ecoinformatics.org)
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-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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If you discover a bug
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please report it, either by email (above) or by using our bug tracking
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system (http://bugzilla.ecoinformatics.org). There is a list of currently
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unimplemented features in Bugzilla that we are working on for the next 
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release (no, we don't have a date yet!).
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Legalese
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--------
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This software is copyrighted by The Regents of the University of California
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and the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis
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and licensed under the GNU GPL; see the 'LICENSE' file for
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details.
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This material is based upon work supported by the 
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National Science Foundation under Grant No. DEB99-80154 and DBI99-04777.
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Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recomendations expressed in this
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material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect 
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the views of the National Science Foundation (NSF).
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