Difference between revisions of "What is ICA-AtoM?"
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ICA-AtoM is built with open source tools (Apache, MySQL, PHP, symfony) rather than proprietary software. The underlying Qubit Toolkit code developed by the ICA-AtoM project is itself open source, with the source code freely available for use or modification as users or other [[Glossary#Developer|developer]]s see fit (under the GPL version 2 license). | ICA-AtoM is built with open source tools (Apache, MySQL, PHP, symfony) rather than proprietary software. The underlying Qubit Toolkit code developed by the ICA-AtoM project is itself open source, with the source code freely available for use or modification as users or other [[Glossary#Developer|developer]]s see fit (under the GPL version 2 license). | ||
| − | Therefore | + | Therefore there is no cost to download any of the software required to run the ICA-AtoM application. |
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* International Standard For Describing Functions (ISDF) - 1st edition, May 2007 | * International Standard For Describing Functions (ISDF) - 1st edition, May 2007 | ||
| − | ICA-AtoM is designed to be flexible enough for adaptation to other descriptive standards; see [[ | + | ICA-AtoM is designed to be flexible enough for adaptation to other descriptive standards; see [[descriptive standards]]. |
Revision as of 12:06, 5 May 2010
Please note that ICA-AtoM is no longer actively supported by Artefactual Systems.
Visit https://www.accesstomemory.org for information about AtoM, the currently supported version.
Main Page > User manual > UM-1 System overview > UM-1.1 What is ICA-AtoM?
ICA-AtoM stands for "International Council on Archives - Access to Memory". It is a web-based, open source application for standards based archival description in a multilingual, multi-repository environment.
Technical overview
ICA-AtoM comprises:
- HTML pages served to a web browser from a web server. Apache is used in development but ICA-AtoM is also compatible with IIS
- A database on a database server. MySQL is used in development but ICA-AtoM uses a database abstraction layer and is therefore also compatible with Postgres, SQLite, SQLServer, Oracle, etc.
- PHP software code that manages requests and responses between the web clients, the application logic, and the application content stored in the database
- The symfony framework that organizes the component parts using object orientation and best practice web design patterns
- The Qubit Open Information Management Toolkit, developed by the ICA-AtoM project and customized to make the ICA-AtoM application
Web-based
All user interactions with the system (add, view, search, edit, and delete actions) take place through a web browser. Users access HTML pages on the web server; clicking a button or link triggers a PHP script that sends a command to the database and returns the output as HTML back to the user's browser.
Open source
ICA-AtoM is built with open source tools (Apache, MySQL, PHP, symfony) rather than proprietary software. The underlying Qubit Toolkit code developed by the ICA-AtoM project is itself open source, with the source code freely available for use or modification as users or other developers see fit (under the GPL version 2 license).
Therefore there is no cost to download any of the software required to run the ICA-AtoM application.
Standards-based
ICA-AtoM is built around International Council on Archives (ICA) descriptive standards:
- General International Standard Archival Description (ISAD(G)) - 2nd edition, 1999
- International Standard Archival Authority Record (Corporate bodies, Persons, Families) (ISAAR(CPF)) - 2nd edition, 2003
- International Standard For Describing Institutions with Archival Holdings (ISDIAH) - 1st edition, March 2008
Future iterations of ICA-AtoM will support:
- International Standard For Describing Functions (ISDF) - 1st edition, May 2007
ICA-AtoM is designed to be flexible enough for adaptation to other descriptive standards; see descriptive standards.
Multilingual
All user interface elements and database content can be translated into multiple languages. The current version of ICA-AtoM (1.0 beta) supports the following languages:
- Arabic
- Dutch
- English
- Farsi
- French
- German
- Greek
- Icelandic
- Italian
- Japanese
- Korean
- Portuguese
- Slovenian
- Spanish
Multi-repository
ICA-AtoM can be used by a single institution for its own descriptions or it can be set up as a multi-repository "union list" accepting descriptions from any number of contributing institutions.