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

       Copyright © 2003-2012 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