Release Name: 2.82rc
Release Date: 24 April 2009
Released: Windows, GNU/Linux, Mac OS/X and Source distributions of Greenstone v2.82rc
Important: This was a release candidate, i.e. a test version. If you are using 2.82rc, please upgrade to the 2.82 proper release. Sourceforge download\
This was a release candidate for the 2.82 release, which will also published on CD-ROM for UNESCO (Aug 2009)
Note for installation: On GNU/Linux and Mac OS/X please choose an installation directory that does NOT have spaces in the path.
Important changes in this release (since 2.81) include, in no particular order:
A version of the easy to use local library server for Windows is now available for GNU/Linux and Mac OS/X. While Windows uses a custom built webserver written to run under Windows 3.1, the Unix versions make use of the Apache webserver, which is installed automatically by the Greenstone installer.
After installation, go to your greenstone home directory and run ./gs2-server.sh to launch the Greenstone Server Interface (GSI) application which will startup the Apache web server. File→Settings on the server interface allows you to change the port that Apache runs on.
Launching GLI will startup the local library server, just as GLI does on Windows.
A command line script, gsicontrol.sh, allows you to start and stop the webserver and change the port via the console, instead of through the GSI interface. If you run ./gsicontrol.sh from the Greenstone home directory it will list the commands available.
If you wish to use a different webserver, this is still possible. For Apache, copy the config settings from greenstone/apache-httpd/linux/conf/httpd.conf to your own Apache httpd.conf file. Thereafter, rename gs2-server.sh (to, say, gs2-server.sh_LocalLib).
For this release, the top-level "gsdlsite.cfg" has been renamed to "llssite.cfg" (local library server configuration file) and its settings are used by the local library server on both Linux and Windows platforms. The "glisite.cfg" file remains as before and its settings are used when GLI launches the local library server.
The Windows local library server now restricts access to localhost connections unless the "allow external connections" option is set through File→Settings in the Greenstone Server Interface window.
The gsicontrol.sh script on Linux and gsicontrol.bat script on Windows additionally allow changing of the administrator password by running the script with "configure-admin".
Collection building now supports incremental deletion and modification of documents and metadata, as well as the previously available support for adding new documents.
The new functionality is controlled by the -incremental flag to import/buildcol.pl, or the "Minimal Rebuild" checkbox in GLI's Create Panel.
File timestamps are used to detect modified files, and a global file scan is used to detect new or deleted documents. The easiest way to use this feature is to use the new incremental-import.pl script. The first time the collection is built, incremental-import.pl notices this and runs a full import.pl, otherwise it will run it with the -incremental flag.
Incremental indexing is only available with the Lucene indexer. MG/MGPP collections will exit with an error if you try to use the -incremental flag when running buildcol.pl. If you want to incrementally update your index directory, you need to use the -builddir option.
The new incremental-buildcol.pl script will call buildcol.pl with the appropriate options set.
The two stages can be run with incremental-rebuild.pl (which just calls incremental-import.pl followed by incremental-buildcol.pl).
Metadata coverage information is also available for collections. Add "store_metadata_coverage true" to the collect.cfg file, and rebuild. See obtaining metadata coverage statistics for more information.
Exploding a database file: the options you have set for the exploding plugin in the Design pane will now be used when exploding.
Search level metadata is now available for translation.
Library Systems Specialist mode has been removed. GLI now has three modes:
GLI now displays Right-to-Left for those languages that read right-to-left. Thanks to Amin Hedjazi for the code.
Rename and Replace options (for documents in the collection tree) now available for the GLI client building collections on a remote Greenstone server.
Downloading is possible now from within the GLI client, if you have a local Greenstone installation and have set up the greenstone environment by running the setup script (setup.bat if on Windows and source setup.bash if on Linux).
MARC(XML)Plugin now imports as Dublin Core, rather than extracted metadata. The marc2(q)dc.txt mapping files have been changed to handle this. Rebuilds of old MARC collections will need index/classifier/format statement upgrades to deal with the new metadata.
The marc2dc.txt mapping file has been updated to more closely match the LOC crosswalk.
OAIPlugin now has a -metadata_set option. If set to auto, the metadata will keep whatever namepsace it had in the file (eg dc). If set to something else, all elements will be mapped to that namespace. A special case exists for "dc": qualified dc elements are represented slightly differently in GLI: spatial becomes dc.Coverage^spatial. A mapping is provided to convert to the GLI version when dc is used.
MetadataEXIFPlugin (experimental): A new plugin is available to extract EXIF metadata from image, audio and video files. It uses the EXIF perl module from CPAN.This plugin works alongside rather that instead of the standard image and video plugins, so these still need to be included in the collection.
The List classifier has been renamed to SimpleList.
The GenericList classifier has been renamed to List, and is now the default classifier in GLI. We encourage use of List rather than AZList/AZCompactList as it handles non-ascii text.
oaiserver (Linux/Mac) and oaiserver.exe (Windows) have both been renamed to oaiserver.cgi.
A few enhancements have been made to the oaiserver program.
Greenstone now supports grouping collections into subfolders in the collect directory. A collection group folder must contain an etc folder with a collect.cfg file, with "collectgroup true" set. Collection metadata "collectionname" and "collectionextra" are used for display. Collections can be placed in a collectgroup folder.
In the library, a single icon will be presented on the Greenstone home page for the collect group (with the "collectionname" as title). Clicking this icon will take users to a second home page, containing all collections that are part of the group.
GLI is able to load and build, delete, and base collections on those in a collect group. But is not yet able to create one inside a group.
Collect groups can only be one level deep, i.e. you can't have a collectgroup inside another collectgroup.
The documented example collections are being updated for Greenstone 2.82, and will be re-released soon. They are now released as a collect group, so no longer clutter up the home page.
There is a new top-level web folder in a greenstone installation. This contains images, style, script, java, and flash folders. This replaces the old images folder, which used to contain CSS and flash files as well as images. New macros are available to access these folders: _httpimages_ (as well as old _httpimg_), _httpstyle_, _httpscript_, _httpflash_, _httpjava_. Collection specific versions of these folders can be accessed using the macros _httpcimages_, _httpcstyle_, _httpcscript_, _httpcflash_, _httpcjava_.
All GDBM files in Greenstone (collection databases as well as users, key, history databases) now use file extension gdb (instead of db/ldb/bdb). Note, a conversion step is applied to old collections, so they should still rebuild ok.
library (unix) and library.exe are both renamed to library.cgi.
Greenstone now compiles under Ubuntu. Please see compiling Greenstone2 for more info on the necessary steps to do this.
Thanks to the following people for updated translations since 2.81:
…and many other minor improvements and bug fixes
We want to ensure that Greenstone works well for you. Please report any problems to the Greenstone mailing list [email protected].