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Compared to its predecessors, version 4.5 of OpenACS has a much more structured organization, i.e. the most significant change is found at the system architecture level, reflected in the following hierarchy:
The OpenACS 4.5 Kernel, which handles system-wide necessities such as metadata, security, users and groups, subsites, and package management and deployment.
The OpenACS 4.5 Core, which comprises all the other packages that ship with the kernel and are most frequently needed by users, such as templating, bboard, and user registration/management. The packages tend to be developed and distributed with the kernel.
OpenACS 4.5 Application packages, which typically provide user-level web services built on top of the Kernel and Core. Such packages include those built by ArsDigita as well as external contributors. Application packages are developed separately from the Kernel, and are typically released independently of it.
This document provides a high level overview of the kernel package. Documentation for the other packages can be found elsewhere.