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George Williams
Feb 24, 2021, 8:33:44 AM2/24/21
to AtoM Users
Hi,
I am am amateur archivist looking after the archive of the Merchant Navy Locomotive Preservation Society (www.clan-line.org.uk). While I have a novice understanding of traditional archive cataloguing, I have zero knowledge about digital archive systems.
Thus, my question is: For AtoM to work with the society's website does it have to be installed on our internet providers servers or does it require a stand alone server which then links to our website.
As a non-technical individual could I please ask that any replies are aimed at the simpleton.
Dan Gillean
Feb 24, 2021, 10:00:15 AM2/24/21
to AtoM Users
Hi there,
Welcome to the AtoM community!
Honestly, either approach could work - it's a question of deployment configuration. The main thing will be for a system administrator to configure your DNS A Record - that is, your domain address (clan-line.org.uk).
Entering your website into a lookup service like whois.com, it looks like this domain certificate was acquired from Fasthosts Internet Ltd. When you have AtoM installed (either on your own server, or a different one), you will eventually want to have someone contact your domain provider, and ask them to update your DNS A Record to include an entry for your AtoM site using a subdomain. A subdomain has a prefix in front of the main domain - for example, if your base domain name is my-site.com, many AtoM users will add their catalogue as archives.my-site.com, or atom.my-site.com, or catalog.my-site.com, etc. While it's technically possible to configure it as my-site.com/atom or similar, it's more complicated to set up and maintain that way, and we generally recommend that maintainers use a subdomain instead.
If you own the main domain, then you can contact your domain certificate provider (Fasthosts) and ask them to add an entry that includes a pointer for the chosen subdomain to your AtoM site. You will need to know the IP address of your new AtoM installation, something that whoever installs the site for you should be able to provide. Once the DNS A record is configured (it may take a day for the redirect to start working after your provider sets it up), then anyone who goes to that subdomain will end up at your AtoM site. You can add links to your AtoM catalog on your website and vice versa, and if you've chosen an entirely different server, your users won't know.
I don't know if your hosting provider is also who has provided the domain certificate, but if they are, and they are willing to handle installation for you, then they should be able to do everything.
From there, it's also possible to develop a custom theme for AtoM that alters AtoM's look and feel to match your home institution site. Here's an example:
- The main United Nations Archives and Records Management Section website: https://archives.un.org/
- Their custom themed AtoM catalog, linked from the main site: https://search.archives.un.org/
You can find many other examples by looking at some of the sites listed on our example Users page on the wiki:
It does require development to create a custom theme. We have some free resources on how to do so, such as:
- Docs: https://www.accesstomemory.org/docs/latest/admin-manual/customization/theming/#create-a-custom-theme
- Slides: https://www.slideshare.net/accesstomemory/creating-custom-themes-in-atom
Also this previous forum response includes an attached PDF that explains how custom theme plugins are organized and installed in AtoM:
Finally, I should mention that Artefactual offers paid custom theming services, if that's of interest. See:
Feel free to contact us off-list at in...@artefactual.com if you are interested in any of our paid services.
Hope this helps!
he / him
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George Williams
Feb 24, 2021, 10:24:24 AM2/24/21
to AtoM Users
Dan,
Many thanks for this speedy and clear reply. Sounds like I need to speak to our webmaster.
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