File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository
Master Thesis Presentation – 04/20/2009
Eastern Michigan University – Department of Computer Science
Thesis Chair: Professor William Sverdlik
Committee Member: Professor Michael Zeiger
Committee Member: Professor Augustine C. Ikeji

Overview
 Introduction
 General Problem
 What have others done?
 TYPO3 Content Repository
 WebDAV
 Implementation
 Results
 Conclusion / Future work
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Introduction
 What is:
 Content?
 Content Repository?
 JCR?
 TYPO3 Content Repository?
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Introduction
 What is:
 Content?
 Content Repository?
 JCR?
 TYPO3 Content Repository?
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Introduction
 What is:
 Content?
 Content Repository?
 JCR?
 TYPO3 Content Repository?
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Introduction
 What is:
 Content?
 Content Repository?
 JCR?
 TYPO3 Content Repository?
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Introduction
 What is:
 Content?
 Content Repository?
 JCR?
 TYPO3 Content Repository?
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

General Problem
 How do I store files?
 Images and other
documents need to be
transferred into the
content repository
„Content is everything“
David Nüscheler
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

What have others done?
 HTTP/1.0 – GET, HEAD and POST
 HTTP/1.1 – OPTIONS, DELETE, PUT
 FTP
 CMIS – Content Management Interoperability
Services v0.5
 WebDAV – set of extension to the HTTP/1.1
protocol
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Goal of study
 To create an
implementation of the WebDAV protocol
to access files
in the TYPO3 Content Repository
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – What?
 A JCR compliant repository in PHP
 JCR combines best
of both worlds
 JCR is a standard
to access a
content repository
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – Why?
 Current situation
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – Why?
 First migration step
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – Why?
 Last migration step
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – How?
 Tree of nodes
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – How?
 JCR defines three levels
 Level 1 – Read access
 Level 2 – Write access
 Optional
 Transactions
 Versioning
 Locking
 Observations
 Access Control
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

TYPO3 Content Repository – How?
 JCR defines three levels
 Level 1 – Read access
 Level 2 – Write access
 Optional
 Transactions
 Versioning
 Locking
 Observations
 Access Control Not implemented yet!
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

WebDAV
 Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning
 A set of extensions to the HTTP/1.1 protocol
 PROPFIND
 PROPPATCH
 MOVE
 COPY
 UNLOCK
 LOCK
 Uses XML and additional headers to transport
information.
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

WebDAV - Benefits
 Locking of resources
 Same user for the content repository as for
the content-application
 Change properties
 Find properties
 Define own properties
 Listing hierarchical data
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Implementation - Requirements
 Define an information model
 add extra informations from files
 Map WebDAV to JCR
 Ensure compatibility to different clients
 Create reusable components
to replace the storage backend
 Support basic file-system functionality
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Implementation - Requirements
 Non-functional Requirements
 Interoperability
 Efficiency
 Usability
 Confidentiality
 Integrity
 Recoverability
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Filename (nt:file)
- jcr:created (date)
Implementation - jcr:createdBy (string)
+ jcr:content (nt:resource)
- jcr:data (binary)
 Information model - jcr:mimeType (string)
- jcr:encoding (string)
- jcr:lastModified (date)
 Basic resource information - jcr:lastModifiedBy (string)
 Additional file information - flow3:contentLength (integer)
- flow3:title (string)
 E.g. image with exif and GPS - flow3:author (string)
- flow3:comments (string)
- flow3:keywords (string)
- flow3:cameraModel (string)
- flow3:imageHeight (string)
- flow3:imageWidth (string)
- gps:latitude (string)
- gps:longitude (string)
- gps:altitude (string)
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Implementation
 Map WebDAV to JCR
JCR
WebDAV
jcr:created
DAV:creationdate
jcr:lastModied
DAV:getlastmodied
flow3:contentLength
DAV:getcontentlength
jcr:mimeType / jcr:encoding
DAV:getcontenttype
primary type: nt:file / nt:folder
DAV:resourcetype
jcr:data
GET and PUT Message-Body
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Implementation
 Component overview
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Implementation - Review
Feature Content Repository File-system
connector connector
Create folder YES YES
Create file YES YES
Delete folder YES YES
Delete file YES YES
Edit file YES YES
List contents YES YES
Copy folder NO YES
Copy file NO YES
Move folder NO YES
Move file NO YES
User auth. NO NO
Versioning NO NO
Locking NO NO
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results
 Introduced
 TYPO3 Content Repository
 WebDAV
 Determined requirements
 Created a design
 Developed a prototype
 Prototype can transfer files into the repository
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results
 Extra information from a file is stored
 Content Repository provides a solution to
consistently store information
 Files are handled in the same way as other
content / no file specific functions
 Content Repository combines benefits of a
Database, a file-system and XML
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results - Efficiency
Action Latency Duration
PROPFIND (15 files) +2.40s (+300%) +65ms (130%)
PROPPATCH +0.35s (+44%) +0ms (+0%)
GET +0.35s (+44%) +12ms(+120%)
HEAD +0.35s (+44%) +12ms(+120%)
DELETE +0.60s (+75%) +0ms (+0%)
PUT +1.50s (+187%) +1ms(+100%)
MOVE - -
COPY - -
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results - Interoperability
User-Agent Encoding of foldername ÄÖÜäöü
WebFolders (Win) %C3%84%C3%96%C3%9C%C3%A4%C3%B6%C3%BC
DAV Explorer (Win) %C4%D6%DC%E4%F6%FC
Naja (Win) (international characters not supported)
Cyberduck (Mac) %C3%84%C3%96%C3%9C%C3%A4%C3%B6%C3%BC
WebDAV-FS (Mac) A%CC%88O%CC%88U%CC%88a%CC%88o%CC%88u%CC%88
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results - Usability
 Not all functionality could be implemented.
 An error occurs when the user tries to
 move a file / folder
 copy a file / folder
 rename a file / folder
 This reduces the usability
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results
 Confidentiality is not provided
 Access Control has not been implemented in the
content repository
 Integrity is provided
 Content-length is checked against the content-length
header
 Recoverability is not provided
 Versioning has not been implemented in the content
repository
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Results - Challenges
 Request Handler doesn‘t support WebDAV requests
 Request Handler couldn‘t be replaced
 MVC Routing Mechanism couldn‘t redirect
to Default Controller of the prototype
 Session->isNodeType was not implemented
 Value->getBinary was not implemented
 PHP 5.3 RC1 is unstable / throws segmentation faults
 Interoperability with different clients
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Conclusion
 Content Repository has been introduced
 WebDAV has been introduced
 A prototype has been created that stores
successfully files with the content repository
 WebDAV is an appropriate protocol
 A standard to use
international characters is missing
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Conclusion
 TYPO3 Content Repository is not ready for
production use but ready for pilot projects
 TYPO3 Association provides a perfect plattform
to develop projects
 The community around TYPO3 is very helpful
and provides useful feedback
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Future work
 Support locking, versioning and authentication
 Tagging content / Virtual folders
 Performance improvements through caching
 Additional filters to extract file information
 Observation of CMIS – Content Management
Information Services
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

DEMO
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Questions?
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository

Thank you
File Access and Storage
with the TYPO3 Content Repository