TapirLink: Enabling the transition to TAPIR Renato De Giovanni TDWG 2007

What is TAPIR? “Computer protocol designed for discovery, search and retrieval of distributed data over the Internet” (TAPIR Exec. Summary). “TAPIR consists of a specification that determines how client applications seeking information should communicate with server applications hosting data” (TAPIR Exec. Summary). Based on DiGIR and BioCASe.

What is TapirLink? Free, open source and generic TAPIR provider software. Based on the well-known DiGIR PHP provider (but not compatible with DiGIR). Current version (0.5) is considered stable and ready to be used in production environment.

Why TapirLink was developed? We needed a second reference implementation, this time from the “DiGIR side”. More than a 100 million records (specimen / observation) are being provided through the DiGIR PHP provider, so we wanted to offer an easy way for them to migrate to TAPIR.

What is a TAPIR provider software? Program that understands TAPIR requests, extracts data from an underlying data source, and sends back a TAPIR response. TAPIR requestTAPIR response TAPIR provider translates request to local query language retrieves data and puts the result into a TAPIR message

Who might want to use a TAPIR provider software? Any data provider that wants to participate in TAPIR networks, or simply wants to provide his/her data through a Web Service. TAPIR is not only about specimen/observation data – you define the type of data that you want to exchange.

TapirLink - Software requirements Web Server (e.g. Apache, IIS). PHP (version >= 4.2.3). Relational database (accessible through PHP ADOdb). Corresponding PHP extension to access the database. Note: if you are running an instance of the PHP DiGIR provider, you already have everything you need to run TapirLink.

TapirLink – Main TAPIR features All TAPIR operations (metadata, capabilities, search, inventory, ping). XML or KVP requests. Any output models (search operation). Any concepts (inventory operation). Query templates with aliases. Complex filters. Log only requests. Maximum number of element repetitions and nesting levels.

TapirLink – Additional features Multiple resources (different endpoints connected to different databases) can be exposed from a single instance. Each resource can map one or more conceptual schemas based on the new DarwinCore pattern or CNS configuration file format. Web configuration interface. LSID resolver. Skins (stylesheets). UDDI registration form. Simple client for testing. Import PHP DiGIR provider configuration.

TapirLink – Known limitations Providers must have tabular data (single table, single view, or multiple tables/views that produce the desired set of records after being joined). There is support to many XML Schema constructs beyond the TAPIR “basicSchemaLanguage”, but this is still unofficial. Concept aliases are still not supported.

Installation instructions Download software from: (alternative: use Subversion) Uncompress Read INSTALL.txt Set correct permissions in specific directories Configure your Web Server to expose two specific directories: one for the service and the other for the configuration interface.

Short demo...

Special Thanks TDWG & GBIF Craig Wieczorek Dave Vieglais Giorgos Ksouris John Wieczorek Kevin Richards Kohsuke Kawaguchi Markus Döring Roger Hyam