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Zoo Arcadia Documentation

Complete documentation for managing your zoo operations with role-based access control, animal health tracking, and visitor engagement features.

What is Zoo Arcadia?

Zoo Arcadia is a full-stack zoo management application built with PHP and a screaming architecture pattern. It provides comprehensive tools for managing animals, habitats, veterinary reports, feeding schedules, and visitor interactions.

Animal Management

Track animals, species, health records, and feeding logs

Role-Based Access

Secure access control for admins, vets, and employees

Veterinary Reports

Health monitoring and nutrition tracking

Habitat Management

Manage habitats with visitor suggestions

Public API

RESTful API for animals, habitats, and services

Docker Ready

Easy deployment with Docker Compose

Quick Start

Get Zoo Arcadia running in minutes with Docker or set up a local development environment.

1

Clone the repository

Download the Zoo Arcadia source code from GitHub.
git clone https://github.com/dumitrusf/zoo-Arcadia.git
cd zoo-Arcadia
2

Choose your environment

You can run Zoo Arcadia with Docker (recommended) or locally with PHP and MySQL.
.\switch-to-docker.bat
docker-compose up -d --build
Access the application at http://localhost:8080
3

Log in with default credentials

Use the default admin account to access the back-office dashboard.
Default credentials are created during database setup. Check the seed data for initial user accounts.
4

Explore the features

Navigate to the dashboard at /home/pages/start to manage animals, habitats, users, and more.

User Roles

Zoo Arcadia supports three distinct user roles, each with specific permissions and responsibilities.

Administrator

Full system access - manage users, roles, animals, habitats, and all content

Veterinarian

Health monitoring - create reports, track nutrition, and update animal health states

Employee

Daily operations - manage feeding logs, moderate testimonials, and update services

Architecture Highlights

Built with a screaming architecture pattern that organizes code by domain, not technical layer.

Domain-Driven Structure

Each feature (animals, habitats, users) is a self-contained domain with its own MVC structure, controllers, models, and views.

Front Controller Pattern

Single entry point (public/index.php) handles all requests and routes them through a central router with session and permission checks.

Security First

CSRF protection, session timeout (11 hours), secure cookie settings, and role-based permission validation on every request.

Modern Asset Pipeline

Gulp-based build system compiles SCSS to CSS, bundles JavaScript, and optimizes assets for production.

Ready to get started?

Follow the quickstart guide to set up Zoo Arcadia and explore all features.

View Quickstart Guide

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