FASTI online

FASTI provides a database of archaeological excavation projects since the year 2000. The project originated in Italy, but now includes a further 9 countries. Effectively FASTI provides a national monuments record for these countries. It is delivered in 10 languages.

ARK provides a web based interface for both the public users of the site and the site administrators. ARK provides a variety of features out of the box which are key to the FASTI project including tight integration of spatial data, sophisticated free text searching mechanisms and web services. The entire site is delivered in standards compliant XHTML 1.0 strict . ARK runs on the industry standard Linux Apache MySQL PHP (LAMP) stack the simplest, fastest, most flexible, affordable and scalable platform for building and deploying Web-based, enterprise-class applications. Mapping data is delivered using a combination of Mapserver, ARK specific code and an OpenLayers interface.

Excavation projects are published in note form including some basic information about the site as well a summary of each season of excavation in both the local language and translated into English. The site is searchable by means of a map interface, structured searches and free text searches. Longer texts are published in FASTI’s online peer reviewed monograph series FOLD&R.