V. 11.5 Elba is out. Force Password Change, better UX/vocabulary for search feature

Posted by Eugenio on 28 Apr 2022

Dear user,
version 11.5 is out. This release contains two main improvements:

1) The new Force Password Change feature

2) A more clear vocabulary and better UX for the search feature

Let me go into some details:

1) Admins can now set, for a user, the new field "Force password change"; if the field is set yes (it's yes by default, when an admin manually adds a new user), the user is forced to change the password after the next login.

2) I realized that the labels of the buttons were not very clear. The "Search" button on the top menu is now called "Advanced Search" (because it is actually a link to an advanced search form) and it only appears when at least one field is available in the search form; the "quick search" submit button on the top of the results grid and the "search for items" submit button in the advanced search form are both just "search" now.
Furthermore, the submit button label for the insert form is now just "Save" (according to the feedback received, "Insert a new item >>" was a bit confusing - but you can still use it if you want).

If you use the online demo, please note that it is still based on V 11.4 so you won't see these improvements.

As usual I suggest to check the change log for the complete list of changes and bug fixes.

You can buy your new license here.

you can upgrade your existing license here.


Best,

--
Eugenio Tacchini
DaDaBIK Founder

V. 11.4 Elba is out. New FIXED HEADER layout + improvements on LDAP and performance

Posted by Eugenio on 28 Feb 2022

Dear users,
In DaDaBIK 11.4 Elba you will find a new fixed header layout, lots of improvements on LDAP authentication, a new config parameter that can improve your app's performance and some bug fixes.

Fixed header was one of the most voted feature in our suggestions forum and it is now available. Especially if you have lots of columns in the grid, it can be very useful.

Here is a preview:



LDAP: we have a new, simple and short, mysubdomain\username (or more in general mysubtree\username) syntax supported for binding; in particular it can be useful if you are using Active Directory and you don't want to specify the full base_dn path for binding. Several other things related to LDAP have been improved and fixed, you can see the complete list in the changelog. All these improvements might help with the issues discussed in this forum thread.

Finally, a new config parameter, $force_search_before_rsults, allows to set, for each table, if you require that a search is executed by the user before showing the results. This can be useful, especially for tables having a lot of records, to avoid the execution of (sometimes useless) SELECT queries when the user opens the related page and to reduce your server's load (and, therefore, possibly increase the performance).

The new LDAP binding feature has been sponsored by: University of Zürich - Department of Biochemistry

The new $force_search_before_rsults feature and a new layout hook (see change log for details) have been sponsored by: Univillage Consulting

There are other changes and bugs fixed so as usual I suggest to have a look at the change log.

You can buy your new license here.

you can upgrade your existing license here.


Peace.

We have a brand new Forum Platform

Posted by Eugenio on 1 Feb 2022

Dear users,

after exactly 20 years, our forum, based on the Phorum platform, is ready to retire.

We have a new, modern, forum, based on the amazing Xenforo platform and I have migrated all the ~20k posts and users to it.

The forum has everything you expect from a modern platform:
- personalized notifications (alert / email)
- you can "mention" another user
- you can "watch" a forum you want to follow
- reactions on posts
- avatars
- gamification (users badges, points, ... )
- media embedding
- looks great on mobile

and much more.

The main URL of the forum is still the same:

https://dadabik.com/forum

Your forum account has been preserved and your old password should just work. In case it doesn't, you can use the forgot password feature and reset it through an email link.
I am not sure if I will be able to migrate your profile pics (avatar), you might need to upload a new one if you want.

Let me know what you think by replying to this email or by posting on this forum thread.

There is one more thing. Xenforo has a special "suggestions" forum type (which allows upvotes) so, apart from the support and general discussion forums, we now have a new Feature Suggestions forum that will replace Canny as suggestions platform so, starting from now, please use the new Feature Suggestions forum to propose/upvote features you would like to see implemented.

What happened to the old suggestions already posted on Canny?

There are about 90 suggestions on Canny and I have imported almost all of them and their related upvotes. If your old suggestions or upvotes are missing feel free to add them; if for some reason you want your suggestions/upvotes to be removed, reply to this email.

I couldn't import the comments (to the suggestions) from Canny but it would be nice to have them so if you can spend a few minutes on that, please copy your Canny comments and paste them in our new forum; I can then change the comments date/time to reflect to original ones if you like.

Goodbye Phorum, you have been a really precious tool for 20 years, allowing the DaDaBIK community to grow and communicate. Welcome Xenforo and thank you for taking us to the new generation
of digital communities!


Best,

DaDaBIK 11.3 Elba is out. Different labels for result grids and more.

Posted by Eugenio on 17 Jan 2022

Dear users,
DaDaBIK 11.3 Elba is out! The main reasons for this releases were a a fix to a bug that prevented to assign a user to a specific group after self-registration and two little but useful new features I have recently developed:

1) the possibility to have different labels for result grids and forms. Often in a results grid you have so many fields that you need shorter labels. Backwards compatibility is guaranteed: if you don't assign a value for label grid (a new form configurator parameter), the "standard" label is used instead.

2) The new $hide_quick_search config parameter

There are other bugs fixed so as usual I suggest to have a look at the change log.

You can buy your new license here, you can upgrade your existing license here.

Finally, one important thing I would like to discuss with you is the behaviour of the previous/next buttons and navigation bar.
I have added a new chapter on the documentation, explaining why this behaviour could be unexpected for the final users of your applications. I have been thinking about better ways to handle these features since quite a long time ago but I haven't found any satisfying solution. I would be happy to hear your opinion, we can use this forum post.


Best,

DaDaBIK 11.2 Elba is out. Improved live edit, graphic layout and more.

Posted by Eugenio on 16 Nov 2021

Dear all,
DaDaBIK V 11.2 is out.

As anticipated in my last message, I am focusing on refining existing features, fixing old known bugs and making the whole DaDaBIK experience as fast and pleasant as possible.

These are the new things I want to highlight here:

1. "Live edit" (i.e. edit data from the results grid) has been heavily improved, removing several of the limitations we had. You can find all the details in the change log.


2. Live edit is now enabled by default, check the chapter about live edit in the documentation to understand which are the current limitations and the implications of having this feature enabled. You can also enable it just for certain fields.


3. The "Forgotten password" feature, introduced in DaDaBIK 11.1, was available only if you allowed users self-registration. It is now available even if user self-registration is disabled.

In addition to that, you will find several graphic improvements and changes to buttons, forms, icons, fonts. I think the interface looks better and more modern but I am still not 100% convinced about the font change, that now is thicker. I think that, overall, it looks nicer but since DaDaBIK is typically used to build applications that end users could use for hours a day, my first concern is always on readability and on avoiding as much as possible eyes fatigue. I would love to hear your opinion about this!

The list of fixed bugs is very long - yes, that old "less_then" typo has been fixed as well :) - so I suggest to read the whole change log. In particular if you were using live edit or custom code in your applications, there are a few tricky issues, now fixed or better explained, to review.

All the online demo are now upgraded to this latest release.

You can buy DaDaBIK 11.2 from here https://dadabik.com/download

You can find all the new features and bug fixes in the change log.

As usual, if you already have a license, get your v. 11.2 copy from the upgrade page.

Enjoy!

Best,

--
Eugenio Tacchini
DaDaBIK Founder