[CONNECTORS-58] ManifoldCF scripting language, executed via the API, plus "example" jobs for file system and web crawl

• Type: Sub-task
• Status: Resolved
• Priority: Minor
• Resolution: Fixed
• Fix Version/s: ManifoldCF 0.3
• Component/s: Examples, Scripting client
• Assignee: Karl Wright
• Reporter: Jack Krupansky
• Created: 09/Jul/10 20:34
• Updated: 01/Sep/11 00:53
• Resolved: 01/Sep/11 00:53

Description

Creating a basic connection setup to do a relatively simple crawl for a file system or web can be a daunting task for someone new to LCF. So, it would be nice to have a scripting file that supports an abbreviated API (subset of the full API discussed in CONNECTORS-56) sufficient to create a default set of connections and example jobs that the new user can choose from.

Beyond this initial need, this script format might be a useful form to "dump" all of the connections and jobs in the LCF database in a form that can be used to recreate an LCF configuration. Kind of a "dump and reload" capability. That in fact might be how the initial example script gets created.

Those are two distinct use cases, but could utilize the same feature.

The example script could have example jobs to crawl a subdirectory of LCF, crawl the LCF wiki, etc.

There could be more than one script. There might be example scripts for each form of connector.

This capability should be available for both QuickStart and the general release of LCF.

As just one possibility, the script format might be a sequence of JSON expressions, each with an initial string analogous to a servlet path to specify the operation to be performed, followed by the JSON form of the connection or job or other LCF object. Or, some other format might be more suitable.

Note: This issue is part of Phase 1 of the CONNECTORS-50 umbrella issue.