Web Knowledge Base

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Features

The Web Knowledge Base is a centralized Information storage and retrieval system that allow one to dump all information and files(.doc, .xls, .ppt, .pdf...) into one location and rtrieve the same using a search string. You can even view uploaded files with the respective applications like MS Word, MS Excel, MS PowerPoint or a Adobe Acrobat in your Web Browser window.

• Uses a well proven search method which is In-Results-Search to easily spot the required recored or file.
• File Upload feature exists to upload any type of file.
• It comes with a Ready-To-Run zip package on Windows. i.e. Just unzip either to C:\ or D:\ and your are ready to run.
• You can create directories while uploading your files and create web links to your files, hence everyone can have their own Home Page and Home Directory.
• User level record updation has been added so no one can modify others records.
• Use it as a central knowledge base, Personal Digital Assistant or a Users' home pages hosting server.

History

The Web Knowledge Base (WKB) came to be where it is now after searching for a tool that could suffice for all my requirements i.e. as a place to dump all the information I want to and not scramble through my paper notes or Diary as to where I wrote that piece of information. Also I can keep my CD collections, my PowerPoint presentations with some search labels and know where there are by just entering a search string to find them. But be warned it is a public area, anyone can find your data(Which is very good ofcourse) but cannot modify it unless they know the password.

Web Knowledge Base System has been running successfully on some intranets with 100-200 people accessing them at my work place as well. It's running on a Windows 2000 machine with a mirror on my local machine. Using msqldump and unison to complete the mirroring as explained in the Docs section here: http://sourceforge.net/projects/wkb/

MS Windows Install

1. Unzip the DdrvWKB1.1.zip install to either C:\ or D:\ depending on the which version of the package you have downloaded.
2. Just to make sure your other perl related applications doesn't interfere with WKB. Set the following enviroment variables by going to Control Panel  --> System --> Advanced Tab --> Environment variables and set the System Variablesor User Variables as below:
       a.  Path =  D:\xampp\perl\bin;
       b.  PERL5LIB = D:\xampp\perl\lib;
3. Then goto D:\xampp\ directory and double click apache_start.bat  then  mysql_start.bat to start both the Apache Web server and the MySQL Database server.
4. Then open you Web Browser like Internet explorer and type in http://localhost/
5. Then click on Configure Now and wait for about ten seconds for you WKB to be configured to your enviroment.
6. Then you can start searching, adding records by clicking on "Click Here and find out what you forgot"  link, after you are redirected to the new page.

Download

MS Windows Downloadable packages:

  Runs in Windows C:\  Drive in zip format
  Runs in Windows D:\  Drive in zip format


CGI /  Mod_Perl  Downloadable packages:

Version 1.1 of Web Knowledge Base in zip format
Version 1.2 of Web Knowledge Base in zip format

The software also can be downloaded from the sourceforge web site below:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/wkb/

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CGI /  MOD_PERL Install

1.  I configured Apache to treat a .pl file as executable perl scritp in any directory
2.  My Postresql is the normal basic installation and you can use the /tbase/infoman.sql to get an idea of how i created a table 'knowdb' with user 'sri'.
   
3. If you don't know how to go about creating the database, use the infoman.bsh to create one for you. but remember you must login in as postgres user and have both infoman.bsh and infoman.sql in the same directory.
4. You would have to update the sections mentioned below in cus_top.html, dirs.pl, infoman.pl upload.pl files.
   
   • between '##### Config Start' and '#### Config End'  section.
   • edit the cus_top.html and make sure the <domainname> is properly replaced with your www.domainname.com
   • edit the dirs.pl, infoman.pl and upload.pl and make sure the <domainname> is properly replaced with your www.domainname.com
     
   • edit the dirs.pl, infoman.pl and upload.pl and make sure the <domaindir> is properly replaced with your local Web ROOT Directory e.g. htdocs or html
   • make sure the variables '$PRIMARY_PATH' in dirs.pl and '$WEB_FOLDER' in upload.pl point to the same directory without deleting '$DOC_ROOT' part in dirs.pl Make sure 'use lib' in all .pl files files point to the directory where SESS.pm resides.
   • make sure in infoman.pl 'DB', 'DBAUTH' and $DB_TABLE match with the correct databaes and user as mentioned in infoman.sql.
   • make sure 'use lib' in all dirs.pl, infoman.pl and upload.pl files point to the directory where OSWEB.pm resides.
   • make sure that '$HOMEDIR' in upload.pl points to a directory under '$WEB_FOLDER' dirctory.
     
5. You can set the Maximum file upload size by modifing the line containing $CGI::POST_MAX.
6. Put the username and their passwords in password.tech file so as to allow users to update their own submitted records, otherwise trying to update records without a user name and password is not possible.

User Manual

1. /home
     |___ upload        --> This is where the uploaded files go to.
     |
   /tbase
     |___ cgi-bin
     |  |___ COPYING
     |  |___ license.doc
     |  |___ OSWEB.pm
     |  |___ dirs.pl    --> This is the Uploadable directories brower script.
     |  |___ infoman.pl    --> This is the main Database access script.
     |  |___ upload.pl    --> This is the file upload script.
     |  |___ password.tech --> This is where you enter the entries "user  passwd" so users can update their records.
     |___ images
     |  |___ back.gif
     |  |___ folder.gif
     |  |___ spacer1.gif
     |  |___ text.gif
     |
     |___ README       --> This is the installation instructions file
     |___ index.html
     |___ cus_top.html    --> to be edited to contain Your domainname.
     |___ cus_fool.html
     |___ infoman.bsh    --> This is the Bash Shell script which creates the 'knowdb' database in BLRSRI
     |                                      Schema and runs infoman.sql
     |___ infoman.sql    --> This is the sql statements to create your knowdb tables.
   
   

1. /htdocs
     |___/sri
     |  |___ home  --> This is where the uploaded files go to.
     |  /tbase
     |  |___/images
     |  |   |___ back.gif
     |  |   |___ folder.gif
     |  |   |___ spacer1.gif
     |  |   |___ text.gif
     |  |___ README        --> This is the installation instructions file
     |  |___ index.html
     |  |___ cus_top.html    --> to be edited to contain Your domainname.
     |  |___ cus_fool.html
     |
   /cgi-bin
     |___ COPYING
     |___ license.doc
     |___ OSWEB.pm
     |___ adddeluser.pl --> This is used to add and delete users.
     |___ dirs.pl     --> This is the Uploadable directories brower script.
     |___ infoman.pl     --> This is the main Database access script.
     |___ upload.pl     --> This is the file upload script.
     |___ password.tech --> This is where you enter the entries "user  passwd" so users can update their records.
    
   

Achieving One Way Synchronization with Master WKB Server

Assuming Master WKB Server is WKBMaster(10.1.10.12) with it's Windows Folder D:\xampp\htdocs\sri shared as 'sri' and the Slave or Mirror Server is WKBSlave(10.1.10.15) with it's D:\xampp\htdocs\sri\.
Run the below commands on the WKBSlave server to synchronize the WKBSlave's Database with WKBMaster's Database.

• On WKBSlave pc map the WKBMaster's shared 'sri' drive as "W:\"
• open command prompt on WKBSlave pc and execute " cd D:\xampp\mysql\bin "
• then execute " mysqldump.exe --opt --host=10.1.10.12 webkb knowdb | mysql --user=root --host=localhost webkb "

Assuming you have downloaded the unison.exe for windows from http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/ and have placed it in WKBSlave's server D:\sriwin directory and mapped the WKBMaster's shared 'sri' directory as 'W:\'
Run the below command on the WKBSlave to synchronize WKBSlave's 'D:\xampp\htdocs\sri\home' directory with WKBMaster's shared 'W:\home' directory.

• open command prompt on WKBSlave pc and execute " cd D:\sriwin "
• then execute " unison.exe  W:\home D:\xampp\htdocs\sri\home -auto -ignorecase -batch -force W:\home "
  

Note: W:\home --> is a locally mapped directory of the remote WKBMaster's " D:\xampp\htdocs\sri " directory and unison.exe is file synchronizer which can be downloaded from http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/ .

Future features, directions

Web Knowledge Base been stabilized in its 1.2 version of the software. I am thinking of adding other features and release another product stream with major features as listed below:

• Add Master/Slave Synchronization features for Multi Server Support.
• Allow option for either 'User Only' or 'World Access' access option to uploaded files and information.

FAQs :