so there was an error when trying to use services for API controllers
that was happening because the api middleware didn't pass the same info
as web middleware, resulting in session info not being passed to
controllers used in the api
after a bit of reading discovered necessary middleware could be added to
api routing so session data is available in in api routing
whew
Got the first part of the API working, which checks to see if there is a
valid session active to set up requests
also some small changes to get the favicon working, yeah, yeah, but it's
cool looking...
Removed the Slim Framework from the codebase and installed the latest
Laravel version to be the new foundation for the project moving forward.
Code from the old version will now be ported to the new version.