Use Case 41 - Archive an Object

Goal

Archive an object so that it is no longer discoverable, but remains accessible by those that already have a reference to it.

Summary

A content owner or manager would like to prevent further discovery of an object though ensure that references to the object (using its identifier) remain valid.

Transition to an archived state is not reversible.

Functionally, archiving an object sets the Types.SystemMetadata.archived property of the associated System Metadata to True. The operation is performed by calling MNStorage.archive() or CNCore.archive(). Since this operation is an update to System Metadata, Use Case 42 - Update System Metadata Properties is invoked and the change is propogated through the system.

Actors

• Client, a content manager or owner (must have write permission)

• Coordinating Node

• Member Node

Figure 1. Use case 41 diagram showing actors and components involved in this action.

Preconditions

• Client has authenticated to the desired level

• Client has write permission on the object

• Object has been synchronized by the Coordinating Nodes

• The object may be replicated to other Member Nodes

Triggers

• A user with write permission calls CNCore.archive()

Post Conditions

• The archive property of Types.SystemMetadata is set to “true”

• System metadata for all replicas of the object is updated

• Search indices are updated to remove the object

Process

Figure 2. Sequence diagram for Use Case 41 illustrating the high level sequence of operations associated with archiving an object.

Example

Using curl to archive an object. ANODE can be any Member or Coordinating Node that has a copy of the object:

# The member node base URL
NODE="https://my.mn.org/base/url"

# A client certificate with a subject that has write permission on the object
CERT="my_client_certificate.pem"

# The identifier of the object to be archived.
PID="object.identifier"

# The provided identifier must be properly URL path encoded
EPID=URL_Encode(PID)

# Invoke the archive operation on the identifier
curl -E ${CERT} -X PUT "$NODE/V1/archive/${EPID}"