DACS_VFS(8)						     DACS Web Services Manual						       DACS_VFS(8)

NAME

       dacs_vfs - access objects through the DACS virtual filestore

SYNOPSIS

       dacs_vfs [dacsoptions[1]]

DESCRIPTION

       This program is part of the DACS suite.

       The dacs_vfs web service is an interface to the DACS virtual filestore. It provides a way to examine, change, and delete items
       independently of how and where they are stored.

       This program is also available as a DACS utility, dacsvfs(1)[2].

	   Security
	   Only the DACS administrator should be able to successfully run this program; therefore, access to it is totally denied by the default
	   rules as a security precaution.

OPTIONS

   Web Service Arguments
       In addition to the standard CGI arguments[3], dacs_vfs requires the following CGI arguments:

       ITEM_TYPE
	   This is the DACS item type, as configured in dacs.conf (dacs.conf(5)[4]), to which the request is to be applied. As a special case, if
	   the value of this argument is the word "enabled", a list of enabled storage methods is displayed.

       REQUEST
	   The value of this argument is the name of an operation followed by zero or more arguments. The syntax is identical to that of
	   dacsvfs(1)[2], except that the edit, update, and help operations are unavailable. For the put operation, the value to store is taken
	   from the VALUE argument.

       VALUE
	   The object to use for the put and load operations.

       FIELD_SEP
	   The field separator character to use for the load and dump operations.

EXAMPLES

       The following examples assume that the web service requests are granted.

       This request will return the revocation list:

	   https://example.com/cgi-bin/dacs/dacs_vfs?REQUEST=get&ITEM_TYPE=revocations

       Assuming the jurisdiction is configured appropriately, the following request will return the roles associated with DEMO::EXAMPLE:jones:

	   https://demo.example.com/cgi-bin/dacs/dacs_vfs?REQUEST=get+jones&ITEM_TYPE=roles

       If the jurisdiction is configured with the directives:

	   LOG_FILE "${Conf::DACS_HOME}/logs/dacs_log-" . strftime("%d-%b-%y")
	   VFS "[logfile]dacs-fs:${Conf::DACS_HOME}/logs/dacs_log-" . strftime("%d-%b-%y")

       then the following request will return the contents of the jurisdiction's DACS log file:

	   https://demo.example.com/cgi-bin/dacs/dacs_vfs?REQUEST=get&ITEM_TYPE=logfile

	   Security
	   The logfile item type is not something predefined by DACS; new (not predefined) item types can be created at will and that is what was
	   done for this example. Since logfiles can potentially include sensitive information, as can other resources used by DACS, it should be
	   obvious why access to this web service should be very carefully managed.

DIAGNOSTICS

       The program exits 0 if everything was fine, 1 if an error occurred. If an error occurs during processing, this web service will return an
       HTTP Status of 400, followed by a blank line which is optionally followed by a descriptive error message.

BUGS

       Only the text/plain output format is implemented.

SEE ALSO

       dacsvfs(1)[2], dacs.conf(5)[5]

AUTHOR

       Distributed Systems Software (www.dss.ca[6])

COPYING

       Copyright2003-2012 Distributed Systems Software. See the LICENSE[7] file that accompanies the distribution for licensing information.

NOTES

	1. dacsoptions
	   http://dacs.dss.ca/man/dacs.1.html#dacsoptions

	2. dacsvfs(1)
	   http://dacs.dss.ca/man/dacsvfs.1.html

	3. standard CGI arguments
	   http://dacs.dss.ca/man/dacs.services.8.html#standard_cgi_args

	4. dacs.conf(5)
	   http://dacs.dss.ca/man/dacs.conf.5.html#VFS

	5. dacs.conf(5)
	   http://dacs.dss.ca/man/dacs.conf.5.html

	6. www.dss.ca
	   http://www.dss.ca

	7. LICENSE
	   http://dacs.dss.ca/man/../misc/LICENSE

DACS 1.4.27b							    10/22/2012							       DACS_VFS(8)