Tools

Click [Tools] in the main menu bar to access the following useful tools available in PHP Report Maker.

Synchronization
Languages
Multi-Language Property Editor
Extensions
Advanced Settings
Copy Table Settings
Copy Field Settings
Sort Tables Alphabetically
Delete Template Cache
Compatibility Properties
Menu Editor

Synchronization

During the course of project development, it is common that you have altered your database schema. To save the effort of doing the customization from scratch again, PHP Report Maker provides you with the ability to synchronize your project data with the database. The synchronization process can be invoked in the following situations:

1. When working in PHP Report Maker

Simply click [Tools]->[Synchronize] or click thebutton on the toolbar to perform the synchronization. PHP Report Maker will check automatically to see if the database schema has been altered. If there are changes, you will be prompted whether or not to proceed with the synchronization.

When open a project file, PHP Report Maker will automatically check the database to see if the schema has been altered. You will be prompted to keep or update to the new schema.

Note: If the database contains a large number of tables/fields, this auto-synchronization feature may make reloading a project file slow. In that case you can disable this feature by unchecking [Tool]->[Auto Synchronize].

Languages

If you want to use multi-language project, make sure you have enabled Mulit-Language in the [PHP]->[General] tab (see PHP Settings), then click [Tools] -> [Languages] to select the languages you want to use in the project. If more than one language is selected, a combobox will appear on the top of the generated scripts for user to select language.

After selecting the languages, select a Default Language in the [PHP]->[General] tab (see PHP Settings).

Language files are placed in the subfolder "languages" under the installed folder.

Note: Only the English language file is provided by our products, you'll need to prepare the language files for other languages yourself. You may also check our website and see if there are any user submitted language files. If you want to share your language files with others (without any conditions), you can submit your language file to us too.

To translate a language, duplicate the shipped english.xml and rename it, it is recommended that the file name should contain alphanumeric characters (and underscore) and in lowercase only.

Open the new XML file with any text or XML editor, you'll see the root node:

<ew-language date="2010/01/05" version="7.0.0" id="en" name="English" desc="English" author="e.World Technology Ltd.">

You must change at least the id, name and desc attributes.

The id is an arbitrary identifier for identifying the language in generated scripts, it must be unique. The should contain alphanumeric characters only.

The name is for displaying the language name in the user interface (which does not support unicode), it should contain alphanumeric characters, underscore and spaces only.

The desc is for displaying the language name in generated scripts, it can be in the encoding of the XML file.

For example, if you want to make language file for Traditional Chinese, you may rename the file as chinese.xml and modify the node as:

<ew-language date="2010/06/28" version="4.0.0" id="cht" name="Traditional Chinese" desc="繁體中文" author="e.World Technology Ltd.">

Then translate the phrases in the file.

To translate table/field/menu captions and other properties supporting unicode, see Unicode Property Editor below.

Important Notes:

1. Multi-Language project must use utf-8 for everything. The charset of the project must be "utf-8".
2. The data in your database must be stored in unicode, otherwise your data will not be displayed properly.
3. If you have to customize the template and put unicode characters directly in the template instead of using language file, always use utf-8 encoding and enable the Advanced Setting UTF-8 output files (see Customizing Template and Tools).

Multi-language Property Editor

Note: If you use single language, you do not need to use this editor at all. If you use Multi-Language (see PHP Settings) , you should always use Unicode Property Editor for above properties. It is the only place you can enter different values for different languages.

Some text properties support unicode input for multi-language project through Unicode Property Editor. Supported properties are:

• Table
• Field Captions
• Field Error Message
• Chart Caption
• Chart X Axis Title
• Chart Y Axis Title
• Chart Primary Y Axis Title
• Chart Secondary Y Axis Title
• Menu Text
• Site Title
• Footer Text

Note that if the Charset (see PHP Settings) of your project is not utf-8, the script will convert the properties to your charset, make sure the characters in your properties are supported by your charset. For example, if you use an unicode Euro dollar symbol in the caption but your project charset is iso-8859-1, the symbol still cannot be displayed in your web pages as iso-8859-1 does not support the symbol. In such cases you should use HTML character entities such as "&euro;" in your caption.

Note: Once you use Unicode Property Editor to enter your unicode text, the unicode property values (in the Unicode Property Editor) will always be used prior to the original property values (in the general user interface) . The original property value will only be used if unicode property value of the language cannot be found. If you want to edit the property, always go back to the Unicode Property Editor.

To edit unicode properties, click [Tools] -> [Unicode Property Editor] to open the editor. Alternatively, you can also click the small button next to above properties in the user interface to open.

Select a property in the Property pane on the left, then enter your properties in unicode. For example, you can copy and paste from Word. Previously saved properties are displayed in bold font.

Extensions

Click [Tools]->[Extensions] to enable or disable these extensions. If the extension has advanced settings (NOT every extension has it), you'll see the [Advanced] tab after selecting the extension. Click the [Advanced] to configure advanced settings for the extension.

Advanced Settings

Advanced Settings are some advanced general settings for PHP Report Maker, or some rarely changed settings for the project, or custom defined settings for use during code generation. Click [Tools] -> [Advanced Settings] to change these settings:

The settings are defined in the settings.xml located at the "src" folder. If you are an advanced user who customize templates, you can also add your own settings to the "Project" section. Open the settings.xml with a text or XML editor, add a <setting> node under the "Project" section. Make sure you provide an unique id to the setting. Supported data type is "String", "Integer" and "Boolean". If not specified, default is "String". The setting value can be retrieved in the template during code generation (note: NOT during runtime of the generated script) using the PROJ.GetV(id) method. Also read Template Tags and Template Object Properties.

Copy Table Settings

If you use database built-in query/view to make an alternate version of a table, you need to set up the table and field settings again, this tool help you quickly copies table and field settings from the source table to the view. Click [Tools] -> [Copy Table Settings] to open the following form:

Select the [Source table] and the [Target table] (e.g. the query/view), click OK to copy the table settings. If a field in the target table has the same name as that in the source table, field settings will also be copied.

Note: This feature copies setting wtihout validation. If settings from the source table/field are not applicable to the target table/field, errors may result. Check the settings after copying.

Copy Field Settings

When you create a Custom View, PHP Report Maker allows you to copy field settings from the source table. However, when database built-in query/view is used, you need to set up the field settings again, this tool help you quickly copies field settings from the source table to the view. Click [Tools] -> [Copy Field Settings] to open the following form:

Select the [Source table] and the [Target table] (e.g. the query/view), the fields of the target table will be listed in the left column, you can then select the respective source fields (from the specified source table) in the right column and click OK to copy the field settings.

Note: This feature copies setting wtihout validation. If settings from the source field are not applicable to the target field, errors may result. Check the settings after copying.

Sort Tables Alphabetically

If you prefer to have the table list displayed in the user interface in alphabetical order, click [Tools] -> [Sort Tables Alphabetically] to do so.

Notes:

1. Re-arranging the table display order by drag-and-drop in the Table Setup page is still supported, so the display order will NOT be re-sorted automatically after synchronizing the project with your database even there are new tables added to the database. Use this tool to sort again if necessary.
   
   
2. Only tables are sorted, the display order of the fields in the user interface or in the generated scripts will NOT be affected by this tool.
   
   
3. The display order of the menu items in the generated scripts is still controlled by the Menu Editor, using this tool will NOT affect the menu items.

Delete Template Cache

PHP Report Maker will reuse the pre-processed template scripts to speed up code-generation. We refer to these pre-processed scripts as "template cache", sometimes these template cache may become corrupted resulting from, for example, generating with a corrupted template or badly customized template. In these cases you may want to delete bad template cache and let PHP Report Maker builds the template cache again. You can do so by either clicking [Tools] -> [Delete Template Cache] or by manually removing the folder for the template under your Documents folder, i.e. <Documents Folder>\PHP Report Maker\Templates\<TemplateName>.zip\. (Also see Customizing Template.)

Compatibility Properties

See Compatibility Properties Setup.

Menu Editor

PHP Report Maker allow you to modify the menu in the generated site, to open the menu editor, click [Tools] -> [Menu Editor] in the main menu or click the "Menu Editor" icon in the toolbar.

Use the following toolbar buttons to manage your menu items:

Your can show/hide the menu items by checking/unchecking the checkboxes beside the menu item text. If a parent menu item is hidden, all the child items will also be hidden.

If you want to use special characters in the menu caption, use HTML entities such as "&#euro;", or you can enter unicode caption using Unicode Property Editor, see Unicode Property Editor above.

If your custom menu items requires login, uncheck [Allow Anonymous User]. For other (non custom) menu items, this setting is same as the List/Search/View permission for Anonymous User in Advanced Security. (See Security Settings.)

After modifying, make sure sure you click [OK] to save the changes.

By default, the menu is vertical and menu items will be displayed using HTML <UL> and <LI> tags only.

Registered user of PHP Report Maker can use the graphical extension and generate vertical/horizontal menus: (Click [Tools] -> [Extensions] to enable the graphical extension, then click [Advanced] tab to set the menu options.)

From PHP Report Maker 5, grouped menu items is supported. Grouped menu items are to be set up in the same way as a sub menu. You can check the title menu item in the Group Title column of the Menu Editor.

Note: Since grouped menu items is only supported in a vertical menu, if you use horizontal menu, you can only use it in sub menus (which are vertical), you cannot use it in the first level of the menu (which is horizontal).