Loader

The loader is the interface between Ariadne and the webbrowser. It processes form input, retrieves and sets cookies, etc.

The loader is the point where Ariadne starts. When someone points his or her webbrowser to an Ariadne site, the URL it requests usually looks something like this:

  http://www.example.com/ariadne/loader.php/

This instructs the webserver to start the script called 'loader.php', which knows to retrieve the ariadne object associated with the path '/' and call its default template ('view.html').

A full description of the logical parts of the URL, as parsed by the loader given the following example URL follows.

  http://www.example.com/ariadne/loader.php/-SeSS-/
     en/an/object/template.html?arg1=x&arg2=y

The loader seperates this URL into a number of logical parts:

  http://www.example.com/ariadne/loader.php

This is the root of the store. This is the fully qualified URL to the loader script that initializes objects from that store.

  /-SeSS-

This is the session id. This is usually only present when you are logged in to Ariadne. It is a unique string which is used to keep track of your credentials, if you change it or omit it, you will need to re-enter your username and password. The session id is optional, it is used to either start or resume a session. You can read more about it at the mod_session page.

/en

This part is the nls selection. This indicates the preferred language that you want the objects to present themselves in. The nls selection is also optional, if not set the defaults as set in Ariadne are used.

  /an/object/

This then is the path of the object in the Ariadne store. This path always starts and ends with a '/'. Each object in Ariadne has at least one path, comparable to the full directory and filename of files on your harddisk. But as you see, each path always ends with a '/', meaning that each object looks a bit like a directory. That is because of the next part:

  template.html

This is the template. This is the 'view' the object will use to present itself. It is important to note that this is not an object in itself, but is simply a way of looking at the object. You can have a small description of an object in a template named 'summary.html' and a full html page in the default 'view.html' template. Each will present information of the same object, but in a different manner. It is important to note that the template is the only place in Ariadne where any output is sent to the browser.

  ?arg1=x&arg2=y

The last part is the query. This contains all kinds of arguments that will be passed to the template.

Besides this, the loader also handles POSTed form entries and has a number of usefull functions.