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@@ -5,6 +5,50 @@
 
 Push-based deposit of software source code artifacts to the archive.
 
+Description
+-----------
+
+Most of the software source code artifacts present in the Software Heritage
+Archive are gathered by the mean of :term:`loader <loader>` workers run by the
+Software Heritage project from sourve code origins identified by :term:`lister
+<lister>` workers. This is a pull mechanism: it's the responsibility of the
+Software Heritage project to gather and collect source code artifacts that
+way.
+
+But there is also a push-based mechanism, allowing Software Heritage partners to
+push their source code artifacts directly in the Archive (without having to do
+so by the mean of an intermediate source code repository already known and
+harvested, like github).
+
+This mechanism is the `deposit`.
+
+The main idea is the deposit is an authenticated access to an API allowing the
+user to provide source code artifacts -- with metadata -- to be ingested in the
+Software Heritage Archive. The result of that is a :ref:`SWHID
+<persistent-identifiers>` that can be used to uniquely and persistently
+identify that very piece of source code.
+
+This unique identifier can then be used to `cite the source code
+<https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-02446202>`_ (e.g. in a `scientific paper
+<https://www.softwareheritage.org/2020/05/26/citing-software-with-style/>`_) and
+retrieve it using the :ref:`vault <swh-vault>` feature of the Software Heritage
+Archive platform.
+
+The differences between a piece of code uploaded using the deposit rather than
+simply asking Software Heritage to archive a repository using the `save code
+now <https://archive.softwareheritage.org/save/>`_ feature are:
+
+- a deposited artifact have codemeta_ metadata attached to it,
+- a deposited artifact is linked to the deposit user with (some) trust,
+- a deposit requires a metadata file describing the deposited artifact,
+- the deposit API uses the `SWORD v2`_ API, thus requires some tooling to make
+  the deposit (which is provided with this repository).
+
+See the :ref:`getting-started` page for more details on how to use the deposit
+client tools to push a deposit in the Software Heritage Archive.
+
+.. _codemeta: https://codemeta.github.io/
+.. _`SWORD v2`: http://swordapp.org/sword-v2/
 
 .. toctree::
    :maxdepth: 2