Frequently Asked Questions


  1. In the Navigation Menu at the top, there are certain links that I wish to display regardless of whether or not a user is logged in. I also do not want the links to appear within a table group. How do I do this?
  2. I just downloaded AppGini and received a virus warning when trying to install. Help!
  3. When I save the project I'm working on, it doesn't update the database on the server? What do I need to do to get it to work?
  4. How to set permission for user at field level? I wish to display some fields to certain users, while other users should view some other fields. How can I do that?
  5. Can we limit the user/group access in terms of period? For example if we wish to archive the data of a certain period keeping the view permission only, without delete or modify permission?
  6. Does AppGini support barcode/QR code readers? How to use AppGini as a point of sale (POS) application?
  7. I turned 'maintenance mode' on from the admin area then accidentally signed out as admin. Now I'm locked out and can't sign in.
  8. I added a new field to a table in my project and regenerated the application. Which files should I upload to my server?
  9. When trying to change the table icon in AppGini, I get an error message "ActiveX component can't create object", and I see blank boxes with no icons.
  10. In AppGini, some of the fields have a red color, some blue, and some with different icons in the left tree-view. What is the meaning of all the colors and icons?
  11. I have a time field in my application that stores the record modification time. It used to display the time correctly until I upgraded to AppGini 4.70. It's now 5 hours late.
  12. I could not upload a 20MB file even when setting up the field to allow so. Tried recreate the field but still failed.
  13. After generating the application, I wanted to change the data type of a field. So, I changed it in AppGini then regenerated the application later. But the actual field did not change.
  14. I forgot the admin password. How can I reset it?
  15. How can I install AppGini in linux/MacOS?
  16. Is it possible to import a CSV file into AppGini?
  17. If I use a third-party form (for example a contact form ... etc) to populate a table in my database, can my AppGini application see and work with the submitted data?
  18. I want to have a rich (HTML) area field, but I want to be able to edit its HTML source code as well. Is this possible?
  19. Can I build a site like amazon.com using AppGini?
  20. Can AppGini build a payroll/HR/accounting/inventory .. etc application for our company?
  21. I'm getting the error message 'no suitable wrapper could be found' for a field that I configured as a Youtube video.
  22. I get a blank page (or 501 server error message) in my app after I click a button/link



Q. In the Navigation Menu at the top, there are certain links that I wish to display regardless of whether or not a user is logged in. I also do not want the links to appear within a table group. How do I do this?

A. You can add links to the navigation menu by adding some JavaScript code to hooks/footer-extras.php
For example:
<script>$j(function(){
    $j('nav .navbar-collapse').append(
           '<ul class="nav navbar-nav">' +
               '<a href="link-url" class="btn btn-default navbar-btn">Test Link</a>' +
           '</ul>'
    );
})</script>
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Q. I just downloaded AppGini and received a virus warning when trying to install. Help!

A. We have a very strict security policy in our AppGini development environment, and make sure to keep it clean and isolated. If you see such warning, first please make sure you are downloading AppGini from our official website, https://bigprof.com/appgini/. You can also inspect the download link, without downloading anything to your PC, using virustotal.com, a free online virus scanning service by Microsoft that scans any link using 70+ antivirus programs. Here is a link to the virus scan results of AppGini on virustotal that indicates AppGini is 100% clean. You can refresh the scan results to run a new scan in there.
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Q. When I save the project I'm working on, it doesn't update the database on the server? What do I need to do to get it to work?

A. To update the database, you need to generate the application (saving the project doesn't create/update the application files). If prompted to overrite existing application files, you should overwrite all (unless you manually modified anything outside the hooks folder) and then upload the generated files to your server, overwriting existing files.

If you made changes before, that aren't applied to the database even after following these steps, just go to the admin area > Utilities menu > Rebuild fields. From there, you can easily fix any missing/changes fields.
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Q. How to set permission for user at field level? I wish to display some fields to certain users, while other users should view some other fields. How can I do that?

A. This is unfortunately not currently implemented though we might implement it in future releases. However, you can use hooks to write custom code for implementing this.
Also check AppGini Customization Course on Udemy (not free but has some lessons that are free to preview); or search for hooks-related questions and answers on the forum.
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Q. Can we limit the user/group access in terms of period? For example if we wish to archive the data of a certain period keeping the view permission only, without delete or modify permission?

A. If you wish to avoid doing it using hooks, you could allow users to edit data owned by their group. At the end of each year/period, change the owner of records to another group. This way, users won't be able to edit the records not belonging to their group.
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Q. Does AppGini support barcode/QR code readers? How to use AppGini as a point of sale (POS) application?

A. Barcode readers work as keyboards … so there is no special setup for using them. Just focus the cursor on the field were you want to enter the barcode, scan the code, and you should now see it displayed in the field. For a POS app, you should typically have an item lookup field in your order details table … when opening the lookup, you'd see a search box … you should scan the barcode into that box to select the item.
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Q. I turned 'maintenance mode' on from the admin area then accidentally signed out as admin. Now I'm locked out and can't sign in.

A. To disable maintenance mode manually if you're not signed in as admin, you need to delete the file "admin/.maintenance". You can do so via FTP or shell access to your web server.
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Q. I added a new field to a table in my project and regenerated the application. Which files should I upload to my server?

A. You can safely upload all the generated files. But if you want to upload only the changed files (due to bandwidth limitations or because you made modifications to the files on the server that you don't want to override .. etc), here is a list of all files that are affected when you modify a table in your project, assuming your table is named tablename:
  • tablename_dml.php
  • tablename_view.php
  • templates\tablename-ajax-cache.php
  • templates\children-tablename-printable.php
  • templates\children-tablename.php
  • templates\tablename_templateDV.html
  • templates\tablename_templateDVP.html
  • templates\tablename_templateTV.html
  • templates\tablename_templateTVS.html
  • incCommon.php
  • updateDB.php
  • link.php
  • ajax_combo.php
  • import-csv.php
  • parent-children.php
  • admin\pageRebuildFields.php
  • admin\incFunctions.php

So, instead of uploading all the generated files, you could upload the above ones. Again, please beware that the first 9 files above are table-specific and tablename should be replaced with the actual name of the modified table. The last 3 ones are common files with fixed file names.

Tip: The above list might change in future releases. Also, if the new field is set as a lookup field, the parent table files might also change. Keeping track of which files change can be hard. But you can make it much easier to track changed files by using TortoiseGit, as explained in this screencast.

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Q. When trying to change the table icon in AppGini, I get an error message "ActiveX component can't create object", and I see blank boxes with no icons.

A. This indicates a missing component in your Windows OS. To fix this, please download and unzip this file into your Windows/System32 folder, then run this command from a command prompt (Start menu > Run > type "cmd" without quotes and click Enter):
regsvr32 C:\Windows\System32\wiaaut.dll
This should resolve this error.
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Q. In AppGini, some of the fields have a red color, some blue, and some with different icons in the left tree-view. What is the meaning of all the colors and icons?

A. The red color means a required field (a field set to "Can't be empty"), the blue is a field containing a web or email link. Here is a legend of the different colors and icons for your reference.
A legend for icons and colors of fields in AppGini
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Q. I have a time field in my application that stores the record modification time. It used to display the time correctly until I upgraded to AppGini 4.70. It's now 5 hours late.

A. AppGini 4.70 introduced the option to specify the time zone for your application. And the default time zone is New York (EST). To change that, open your project in AppGini, and from the database properties page click on the button labeled "Change time zone", select your desired time zone, and regenerate your application.
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Q. I could not upload a 20MB file even when setting up the field to allow so. Tried recreate the field but still failed.

A. In addition to the upload size setting in AppGini, you should also check the variable "upload_max_filesize" in the "php.ini" config file. Make sure it's larger than the size of your file.
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Q. After generating the application, I wanted to change the data type of a field. So, I changed it in AppGini then regenerated the application later. But the actual field did not change.

A. AppGini supports applying field changes automatically to the database, but sometimes the changes won't apply correctly.

To apply the changes manually go to the admin area > Utilities menu > Rebuild fields. From there you can check if any fields are not up-to-date and fix them.
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Q. I forgot the admin password. How can I reset it?

A. You can reset your password by opening the "config.php" file, find the line starting with:
'adminPassword' => 
And change it to:
'adminPassword' => '21232f297a57a5a743894a0e4a801fc3',
Next step, using phpMyAdmin or a similar MySQL administration tool, open/select your database and go to the membership_users table .. find the admin user and change the passMD5 field value to 21232f297a57a5a743894a0e4a801fc3. You can alternatively do so by executing this query:
UPDATE `membership_users` SET `passMD5`='21232f297a57a5a743894a0e4a801fc3' WHERE `memberID`='admin'
Change admin in the above query to the actual administrator username.

Now, you can log into the admin area using the password admin. You should then change the password from the admin settings page.
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Q. How can I install AppGini in linux/MacOS?

A. Although we don't fully support installing AppGini on non-Windows platforms, you might be able to run AppGini under Linux using PlayOnLinux and under Mac OS using PlayOnMac.

You could also install AppGini under Wine by following these steps:
  1. Make sure you have Wine (preferably the latest version) installed and running correctly.
  2. Download Winetricks: you can download it using this command from a terminal window: wget http://kegel.com/wine/winetricks
  3. In the same terminal window, execute this command: sh winetricks vcrun6 wsh56
  4. Download AppGini and extract the setup.exe file from the downloaded zip file.
  5. You might need to grant execute permission to the exe file. Consult your OS documentation for how to do so.
  6. finally, execute the setup.exe file and follow the setup screens.
After following the above steps, you should now have AppGini installed and ready to run. An easier very low cost alternative is to install AppGini in a remotely-hosted Windows virtual machine ... This would save you a lot of setup time and effort.
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Q. Is it possible to import a CSV file into AppGini?

A. Update as of AppGini 5.90 and above: You can allow some user groups to import CSV files to your database through an intuitive CSV import page. Please see the screencast explaining how the new CSV import page works, and how to enable it for specific user groups.

Yes, this can be done on 2 steps: importing the field names (if the table doesn't already exist), then importing the data.

To import the field names from your csv file into AppGini, open the file menu > Import > Table from CSV file. Then follow the instructions.

After generating the php application and uploading it to your server, you can import data from your csv file into the application. First, log into the admin area, then click the link labeled "Import CSV data", and follow the instructions.
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Q. If I use a third-party form (for example a contact form ... etc) to populate a table in my database, can my AppGini application see and work with the submitted data?

A. Yes. You can use any form to capture and store the data into the database. Any records added by this form will then be accessible to your AppGini application. However, only the users who have "view all" access to the table populated by your contact form will be able to view the records ... If you have configured your AppGini application (in the admin area) to have groups who can view group-only or owner-only records, they won't be able to see those new records.
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Q. I want to have a rich (HTML) area field, but I want to be able to edit its HTML source code as well. Is this possible?

A. The rich editor component that comes with AppGini doesn't support code editing ... So, you should use this NicEditor version instead (unzip and copy the 2 files to the folder where you generated your application, replacing the existing ones).

The next step is to open the generated "templates/tablename_templateDV.html" file in a text editor (where tablename is the name of the concerned table) and find this line:
new nicEditor().panelInstance('fieldname');
(where fieldname is the name of the concerned field) ... Change that to:
new nicEditor({ fullPanel : true }).panelInstance('fieldname');
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Q. Can I build a site like amazon.com using AppGini?

A. No! An advanced web application contains many specialized views, reports and workflows that AppGini can't help you with. However, AppGini can help you get a very quick working prototype of the data views of your application so you can easily identify the features you'd like to implement ... It can also help you build a simple responsive admin area where you can add, edit, sort, and search for data using your PC or any mobile device. Although this might not sound as much, it still can save you tens or even hundreds of development man-hours, and helps you easily communicate your application idea and details to your developers so they can get started building your next amazon.com :)
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Q. Can AppGini build a payroll/HR/accounting/inventory .. etc application for our company?

A. AppGini can help you quickly design and prototype your payroll or any other database system. In a very short time, you'd be able to have a multi-user data entry app for your system with configurable user/group permissions. At this point, you'd have already saved hundreds of man-hours in design, prototyping, development and testing.

From there, you might need to extend your application by adding reports, validation rules, workflows, ... etc. Although AppGini doesn't automatically create those for you, it does offer easy customization through hooks. Hooks allow you to write minimal code to add extra features .. and we have many resources to help you with that, including the online documentation and our 3.5 hours video course ... You can also search the topics on our forum or post your questions where thousands of users are willing to help you.

In addition to customization through hooks, we provide various plugins to extend the functionality of AppGini apps by adding custom search pages, summary reports, batch actions, calendars, and layout customization. For details please check our products page.
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Q. I'm getting the error message 'no suitable wrapper could be found' for a field that I configured as a Youtube video.

A. Your server must have the allow_url_fopen property set to true. You can set it in php.ini, the php configuration file. If you don't have access to that file, you should contact your server administrator to enable it.
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Q. I get a blank page (or 501 server error message) in my app after I click a button/link

A. Usually there is a more specific error message reported by your server that would help diagnose this issue. Please check your server error log file for the exact error that occured. The location of the error log file varies based on OS, type of web server and the way the web server is configured.

For example, if your server OS is Ubuntu/Debian with Apache web server, the location is typically /var/log/apache2/error.log. A quick google search would typically help you find the exact location.

Once you've found the logged error message, if you are unable to fix the issue yourself, feel free to send it to us via a support message, or post it to the forum.
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