Open Source Digitalization Application

Users Manual

Easyndexer
by Ral Diez
This is version 1.0 of the Easyndexer users manual.

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/.
2012, 2013 Ral Diez

Table of contents
1. Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 4
2. Starting Easyndexer ............................................................................................................ 5
2.1. Language selection ........................................................................................................ 5
2.2. Login ............................................................................................................................ 7
2.3. Roles in the system ....................................................................................................... 8
3. Administration Panel ......................................................................................................... 10
4. Users Manager ................................................................................................................... 11
4.1. Editing an existing user ............................................................................................... 13
5. Databases manager ............................................................................................................ 14
5.1. Creating a new database .............................................................................................. 16
5.2. Change users settings ................................................................................................. 17
5.3. Edit database .............................................................................................................. 18
6. Inside of a database ........................................................................................................... 19
6.1. Reading a table............................................................................................................ 20
6.2. Create new table ......................................................................................................... 21
6.3. Copy of a table............................................................................................................ 23
6.4. Delete a table .............................................................................................................. 24
7. Managing tables ................................................................................................................. 25
7.1 Add dir ........................................................................................................................ 27
7.2 Image view .................................................................................................................. 28
7.3. Edit an entry ............................................................................................................... 30
8. Languages management ..................................................................................................... 31
9. Practical example ............................................................................................................... 33

1. Introduction
Easyndexer is a web application for creating and managing databases with scanned
documents. Its interface is friendly and it use is very easy, to provide to the common
user a tool to create these databases without advanced knowledge of the field.
This document describes the use of the first version of the program.

2.

Starting Easyndexer

To run the application, it is necessary first to have running in the Apache Server. For
those who installed XAMPP, it is only necessary to run XAMPP control manager and
to ensure the Apache process is running.
In the server machine, it is possible to run the application with the icon on the desktop
or typing on the web browser localhost/easyndexer.
To run in a client machine, it is necessary to have configured the Local Area Network
(LAN) to access to the folder of the webpages of the server. After, it can be accessed
by typing on the web browser localhost/easyndexer or if you copied the file
Easyndexer client on your computer, by clicking on it.

2.1.

Language selection

When the application runs, this is the first screen that appears on the screen in the web
browser.

Figure 2.1: Getting started

This is the menu to select the language. To change the language, click on the language
form, select the chosen language and click on the Go! button.
If you are interested on knowing more about Tedeco Association, click on the link on
the bottom of the page.

2.2. Login
After select the language, there is a login form. The system asks you about typing the
user name1 and the password.

Figure 2.2: Login form

In this screen, you can come back to the language selection, by clicking on the button
on the top, on the right.
You can start using the application by typing the username and the password and
pressing the Accept button. Depending on the type of user (permissions) the next
screen will be different:

If you are a guest, normal user or a manager, go to Section 5: Database panel.

If you are an administrator, go to next section, Administration panel.
If you are a translator, go to Section 6: Translation and languages.

If you press the Reset button, the typed data will be erased.

The username and the real name of the user are different things. The username is provided by the
administrator. If you have any doubts, please contact the administrator.
1

2.3. Roles in the system

The user can represent several roles in the system depending on the function that
realizes and the sources can access.
Each role has a user type in the system and a level of privileges. These types of user
are:
1. Administrator: He controls the whole application. He can access to all the
sources, functionalities and all the databases. He can manage the users
accounts, the languages and all the databases.
2. Manager: He just can access to the databases managing part. Apart from his
own databases, he can access to the public and medium-privacy databases of
the other users.
3. User: This is the normal user. He just can access to the database managing
part. Apart from his own databases, he can access to the public ones of the
other users in a read mode.
4. Guest: This is the one who has fewer privileges. He only can access to the
databases manager but he cannot edit, create or delete databases. He only can
read the public databases.
5. Translator: This is a special type of role. He only can access to the Languages
Manager to create, edit or delete languages of the application. 2

To sum up, here there is a couple of tables that show the privileges of each type of
user. The first one corresponds to the functionalities the user can use, and the second
one represents the databases that can be accessed.

Functionality Administrator Manager

User
Guest
Users
Yes
No
No
No
Manager
Databases
Yes
Yes
Yes
Read only
Manager
Languages
Yes
No
No
No
Manager
Table 2.3.1: Users functionalities

Translator
No
No
Yes

The pre-installed languages are not editable by nobody. The translation management panel is just a
tool to help to spread out the application.

Type of User
Administrator
Manager
User
Guest
Translator

Own
Others
Others
databases
Public
Semi-private
(No matters
databases
databases
privacy)
Read/Write
Read/Write
Read/Write
Read/Write
Read/Write
Read
Read/Write
Read
Forbidden
Read
Forbidden
Forbidden
Forbidden
Table 2.3.2: Privileges on the databases

Others
Private
databases
Read/Write
Forbidden
Forbidden
Forbidden
Forbidden

3. Administration Panel
When an administrator is logged, this is the main panel he can see:

Figure 3.1: Administration panel

The main functions of this panel are managing the users, manage the databases and
managing the language packages. If you press the button of Users management (1), the
system opens another panel with the users and their settings, as it is showed in the
Section 4: Users Manager.
If the button with Databases management is pressed (2), the system opens another
panel with the databases and their settings, as it is showed in the Section 5: Databases
Manager.
If the admin press Languages Management button (3) the system shows the translation
options, to manage the languages created by the translators. For further information,
check Section 6: Languages Manager.
You can check electronically the manual by clicking the link in the message (4).
To close the session and go to the beginning, click on the top right-hand corner (5).

10

4. Users Manager
The Users Manager panel is a tool used to create new users accounts, edit existing
users and delete existing users with their databases.
This is the main window of the Users Manager:

Figure 4.1: Users manager

As it can be observed in the figure, the data are showed in a table, where each row
represents a user and every column a parameter of users. These parameters are:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

ID: A numeric unique number which represents the user.

Username: A username given by the administrator to login to the system.
Password: Access password to use the system.
Name: Real name of the user.
Surname: Real surname of the user.
Privileges: This represents the role of the user in the system (Section 2.3. Roles
in the system)

There are also two extra columns in the table. These columns are for editing the user
(1) or to delete it (2). If you press the link Edit in the row of an existing user, the
system will show a form to edit the parameters of the user, as it is showed in the
Section 4.1. If the link Delete is clicked, the user and all his databases will be deleted.

11

It is possible to create a new user by entering the data3 in the last row of the table (3),
choosing the type of user and pushing the button Create. If the button Reset is
clicked, the typed data in the form will be erased without creating the new user. When
a new user is created, the system gives to him an automatic ID number, unique in the
whole system. This number can be checked in the first column of the table.
To come back to the administration panel or to close the session, you can use the
navigation buttons on the top right-hand corner (4).

It is very much recommended to type all data without spaces between the characters.

12

4.1. Editing an existing user

Once clicked on the link Edit in the users management panel, a new form with the
users data is showed, like in the next figure.

Figure 4.1.1: Edit user settings

To change one or several parameters, just change them in the form and click on the
button Accept changes. If you want to come back without change anything, click on
the button Cancel changes.

13

5. Databases manager
The databases manager is a tool to create, manage and view the databases created by
the user. The next figure shows this panel.

Figure 5.1: Databases manager

It can be observed in the figure that there are some buttons and a table. In the table it
is represented all the databases that the user can access according to the Section 2.3:
Roles in the system.
In the panel it is possible to see two buttons after the title. The first one (1, Create
new database) takes the user to another window of the system to create a new
database (Section 5.1: Creating a New Database); and the second button (2, Change users
settings) takes the user to another window with a form with the information that the
user is allowed to change (Section 5.2: Change users settings). It is important to know that
a Guest cannot access to create a new database, so the first button it is now showed to
a user logged as a guest.
Down these buttons, there is a table. In this table there are all the databases that the
user can access. If there is no database available, the system shows a message: There
are not accessible databases for this user.
When the user has access to some databases, the table (3) shows the general
parameters of each database and some options depending on the privileges that the
user has on the database. It can be observed that for each database the system shows:

ID: Identification number of the database. Automatic unique number to

identify the database in the system
Name: Databases name given by the user who creates it. It is recommended
this name to be representative and without spaces. It has to be unique in the
databases of a user.
14

Owner: This is the user who creates the database.

Visibility: This is the level of the visibility that the database has, according to
the Table 2.3.2. Based on this, a database can be:
o Private: Only the owner or an administrator can access.
o Normal: It can be accessed by the owner, an administrator and a
manager; the first two ones with all the privileges and the second one
just with reading privileges.
o Public: It can be accessed by the owner, administrators, managers,
other normal users and guests. The first three ones with all the
privileges and other normal users and guest just with reading privileges.

Apart from these parameters, there are represented in the table three columns more
with the options of the databases. If you press the Access button, the system opens
the database and shows another page with the information and the options to manage
or view the database (Section 6: Inside of a database). If the Edit button is pressed,
automatically the system redirects to a form with a form to edit the name and the
visibility of the database (Section 5.3: Edit database). If the Delete button is clicked, the
system shows another page to ask the user if this is really the action he want to do, and
if the user accept the operation, the system deletes the database.

15

5.1. Creating a new database

When the user presses the button to create a database, the system shows the next page.

Figure 5.1.1: New database.

In this point, the user has to give the main parameters of the database (1 and 2), and
press Accept to create it (3), or Cancel to not save the changes.
The main parameters of the database are:

Database name: It is a name to identify a database. It is not possible to use

spaces in the name. The name has to be unique for each user. This means that
one user cannot have two databases with the same name, but another different
user could have a database with the same name.
Visibility: This parameter decides the level of privacy that the database can
have, according to the Table 2.3.2 on page 8. It is possible to choose between:
o Private
o Default
o Public

After giving the main parameters the user can accept to create the database or cancel
to come back without saving. If there is any fail creating the database, the system will
show an error message after pressing the button of accept, and the database will not be
created. When a database is created, its empty. It means that there is no table in the
database.

16

5.2. Change users settings

When the user presses the button to change users settings, the system shows the next
page.

Figure 5.2.1: Change users settings.

As it can be observed in the figure, the only settings that the user can change are the
name, the surname and the password. Other parameters like the username and the
type of user only can be changed by the administrator. It is necessary to type the old
password to change something.
To accept the changes and save the new press the button Accept changes. To come
back to the databases manager without saving the changes, press Cancel changes.

17

5.3. Edit database

When the user presses the button to edit a database, the system shows the next page.

Figure 5.3.1: Edit database

This figure shows that it is possible to change the visibility and the name of a database.
If the name changes into a wrong one, the systems shows an error message and it does
not change anything.
To save the changes, press Accept changes. To exit without saving, press Cancel.

18

6. Inside of a database
When the user presses the button to access a database, the system shows the next
screen.

Figure 6.1: Inside of a database

This is the main panel of a database. First of all, there is a summary with the most
important information about the whole database (1), and after, the tables are showed
with some information about each one (3).
To create a new table in this database, it is necessary to click on the button 2, Create
new table, and a form will be showed as it is described on Section 6.2: New table.
In the area of the tables (3), the system shows some information about them like the
name, if it has scanned documents or not, the number of fields (columns) and all the
options the user can do with the table. Depending on the type of user and the privacy
of the database, different options are showed.
These options can be:

Open: Opens a table with writing privileges (Section 7: Managing tables)

Read Only: Opens a table with just reading privileges (Section 6.1: Reading a
table)
Copy: Creates a copy of the table with another name (Section 6.3: Copy a table)
Delete: Deletes a table and all the data (Section 6.4: Delete table)

Like the other panels, it is possible to come back to the Databases Manager or to close
the session with the navigation buttons on the top-right handed buttons (4).

19

6.1. Reading a table

When the user only has reading privileges on the database, it is not possible to edit
anything on it, but it is possible to open and view its tables, by pressing Read only
on one of them, as it shows the next figure.

Figure 6.1.1: Reading a table

The figure shows that the only operation that the user can do is to take a look on the
table and to see the documents apart by pressing the button See on the row of a
document. Also it is possible to do some search with the native tools of the web
browsers (check the manual of your own one).
It can be observed that every document is identified by an ID number. This number is
unique in the whole table and it is automatically given by the system.
Like the other panels, it is possible to come back to the Database panel or to close the
session with the navigation buttons on the top-right handed buttons.
To check the operations that you can do with writing privileges on a table, please
check Section 7: Managing tables.

20

6.2. Create new table

When the user presses the button to create a new table, the system shows the next
form.

Figure 6.2.1: New table, first step

This first form is to decide the main parameters of the table such as the name of the
table and the number of fields. The name cannot have any spaces and it has to be
unique inside of a database.
Always it will be created an extra numeric field, ID, to be the key of the table, so the
user can decide the rest of the fields.
It is possible to create a table with or without scanned docs. The aim of the application
is to have the scanned documents in the tables of the databases, but if the parameter
Docs is not selected, it is possible to create normal tables with normal data.
Once selected all the main parameters, the user can accept them to go to the next step
or to cancel the changes.
In the next step, as it is showed in Figure 6.2.2, the user has to choose the names and
types of the columns (fields). The type of admitted data is:

Integer
Float
Yes/No (Boolean)
Text (0-20 characters)
Long text (0-256 characters)

After select the fields, the user can accept the parameters and create the empty table or
to cancel, coming back to the database panel without saving the changes.

21

Figure 6.2.2: New table, second step.

If there is any fail, the table will be created. Otherwise, the system will show an error
message and it will not create the table.

22

6.3. Copy of a table

When the user presses the button to copy table, the system shows the next form.

Figure 6.3.1: Copy table

To copy a table it is necessary to give a name to the table and accept the operation. If
the user pushes the Cancel button, any copy will not be created. If the user pushes
the Accept button, the system will create the table. If the name of the table is not
correct, the system will show an error message.

23

6.4. Delete a table

When the user presses the button to delete a table, the system shows the next question
just to ensure if the user really wants to do it or not.

Figure 6.4.1: Delete table

If the user accepts the operation, the table and all its contents will be deleted. If the
user pushes the Cancel button, the system will come back to the database panel
without saving the changes.

24

7. Managing tables
When a table is opened with writing privileges, the user access to a view where can do
several operations with the table, as it is showed in the next figure.

Figure 7.1: Table view

This screen is very similar to the one showed in the Section 6.1.1: Reading a table.
Indeed it is the same one but with more options to edit the table.
First of all, on the top of the screen, we can find a button to add a folder of
documents to the table called Add dir (1). To learn how to do it correctly, check the
Section 7.1: Add dir.
Apart from this view, there is another view to see the documents while the user can
edit the entries of the table in the same time. This is the Image view, and it is possible
to go there by clicking the link with the label 2. To know more about this view, check
the Section 7.2: Image view.
In the area of the table, there are some buttons that allow the user to do several
operations on a document (entry) of the table.

If the user pushes See (3), the system will open another view with the
document.
If the user pushes Edit (4), the system opens a form to edit the entry of the
document. To know more about this option, please check the Section 7.3: Edit
an entry. It is also possible to edit an entry of the table with the Image view, as
it is showed on Section 7.2: Image view.
If the user pushes Delete (5), the entry is automatically deleted from the
table.
25

At the bottom of the table (6), there is also a form where the user can add some
documents or entries without documents to the table. If the user wants to add an entry
with a document, he has to type the route of the file in the field Document. If the
user does not type rightly the document route, the message File not allowed will be
showed. It is possible to type another kind of file; and in that case the system will
create a link to the file. All the files have to be in the server. It is also possible to leave
this field empty, and in this case the system will show the message No file on the
cell.
The formats of file of scanned documents that are suitable with the application are:
-

Standard images (*.jpg, *.jpeg, *.bmp, *.png)

Tif images (*.tif, *.tiff)
Pdf documents (*.pdf)

Like almost in all the screens of the application, it is possible to come back to the
previous panel or to close the session using the navigation buttons on the top-right
handed corner (7).

26

7.1. Add dir

When the user presses the button to add a folder (Add dir), the system shows the next
form to do the operation.

Figure 7.1.1: Add dir

First of all, it is important to know that it is necessary to have the folder with the batch
of documents in the folder of the system Easyndexer called scanned
(Easyndexer/scanned/). It cannot be added another folder of documents that is not in
this folder.
In the screen it is possible to differ two different parts:
1. The first part is to select the folder of documents. The user has to type the
name of the folder to add it or the route inside of the scanned folder if it is
not direct inside of it. For example, if we have the documents inside of a folder
called batch0001 in the scanned folder (Easyndexer/scanned/batch0001),
the user only has to type the name of the folder: batch0001; and all the files
with the scanned documents will be automatically added to the table. It will be
created an entry in each
2. The second part is to fill the rest of the fields of the table with automatic
values. If the user fills one of the fields with a value, when the system adds all
the documents to the table, all of them will have the same value. If the user
leaves the fields empty, the fields will be empty. In any case, the fields can be
edited after adding the files.
After filling the information of the form, if the user pushes the button of accept, the
system will add the files and it will come back to the table view. If the Cancel button
is pushed, the system goes back to the table view without adding any entry to the table.

27

7.2. Image view

When the user is in the table view and he pushes on Image view, the system opens a
new screen where is easier to fill or edit the files watching at the same time the
document to index. This view is showed in the next figure, and it is only possible to
access to this view when the user has writing privileges and the table has documents
attached.

Figure 7.2.1: Image view

This is the main view to index the documents in the tables. This is the easiest way to
do the process.
In this screen, it is possible to distinguish the button to add a folder (1), the selection
of the view (2) and the navigation buttons (6) like in the table view (Figure 7.1: Table
view). They have the same usage as it is described at the beginning of Section 7.
A little bit further, on the left, it is possible to distinguish a form labeled with Fields
& values (3). In this area, the user can edit or view the fields of the table associated to
the document. The document is in the big area on the right (5).
To save the changes of the fields, to delete the entry of the document or to navigate
along the documents of the table, it is necessary to use the buttons under the form.
Each button has a different functionality, at the next figure shows.
Like almost in all the screens of the application, it is possible to come back to the
previous panel or to close the session using the navigation buttons on the top-right
handed corner (6).

28

Figure 7.2.2: Buttons of the image view.

29

7.3. Edit an entry

When the user presses Edit on an entry of the table, the system shows the next form
to do the operation.

Figure 7.3.1: Edit an entry.

Apart from the Image view, this is another way to edit an entry (register, row) of the
table.
Once the user edit the fields he wants, it is possible to accept the changes and come
back to the table view by pushing the Accept changes button, or to exit without
saving the changes by pushing the Cancel changes button.

30

8. Languages management
This is a module apart from the application to help the people to translate this
program into minority languages. When a translator is logged in the system or an
administrator selects the Languages management button, the system shows the
following form:

Figure 8.1: Language manager

In this screen it can be observed that there is a form. In this form, the user has to
choose one or two existing languages to be the origin of the translation, and after, he
has to type the language to create or edit. For example, if the translator wants to
translate the application into Kirundi, he has to select one or two of the existing
languages and type Kirundi in the box. Then, when he pushes the button Start, the
system will take him to the language translator help panel, like it is showed on the
Figure 8.2.
When the Start button is pushed, the system creates the language package if it does
not exist, and if it exists, the system opens it. It is not possible to create a language
package with an existing name and neither is possible to edit a package of the
installation of the application. If the user tries to do it, the system will show an error
message.
In the translator tool, there is showed a table where there are all the messages of the
application, first in the origin selected languages and then in an editable column with
the messages in the language to edit. When the language is new, this column will be
empty, like the example shows.

31

Figure 8.2: Translating tool

At the bottom of this screen, there are four buttons to manage the translating tool:
Save language: Save the changes made on the messages of the language.
Activate language: Put the language into the system, it means that it can be
used by the rest of the user as a normal language. To activate a language, it is
necessary to fill all the messages. If the user tries to activate an incomplete
language, an error message will be showed.
Deactivate language: Deactivates the use of a language. It means that the
language cannot be used, but it is still in the system. If the user tries to
deactivate a deactivated language, nothing would happen.
Delete language: Deletes a language package from the system.

32

9. Practical example
To show better the use of Easyndexer, lets see a practical example.

9.1. Background
Imagine a city hall in a small town. They want to digitalize their files such as birth
certificates. They have in a store, boxes and boxes with the printed and signed
certificates, classified by month and year.
They pretend to create a database to access to the information easily, allowing looking
for the documents by name, surname, month or year.

9.2. Process
To do this using Easyndexer, the first step that they have to do is to scan the
documents and to save them in the corresponding folder (Easyndexer/scanned).

Figure 9.2.1: Scanned files

As it can be observed in the Figure 9.2.1, a possible way to scan that is to take each
folder with the documents of one month, scan them and save them in a folder, having
in each folder a batch of documents as the Figure 9.2.2 shows.

33

Figure 9.2.2: A batch of scanned documents.

9.3. Indexing process

Once scanned the documents, we have to access to the Easyndexer system and to
create a database, for example with the name Certificates (Check section 5.2).
In this database, we can create a table for each year or a table for all the documents.
There is no limit in the number of elements of each table, but if this number is too big,
the system could be slower than usually depending on the computer. The only limit
that the system has it is the fact that the databases cannot be bigger than 2GB. In this
particular case, we will chose to create a table for each year, even if the files of each
month are in different folders, like the Figure 9.3.1 shows.
When we create the table, we have to choose the fields to index each document to find
them easily after. In this case suppose that we need to index them by month (because
each table is one year), name and surname.
If we open the table, it can be observed that there are no entries with the documents,
it is empty. To add the corresponding documents we can do it one by one in the table
view, but it is easier to do it by adding the folder (check Section 7.1: Add dir). In this
particular case, we scanned the documents and saved them into folders classified by
months, so we can add one folder and set the automatic field of Month, as it is
showed in the Figure 9.3.2.

34

Figure 9.3.1: Certificates Database

Figure 9.3.2: Adding a folder

Adding the files in this way will provoke that the system will create an entry for each
document, and all of them with the data August in the field Month. Of course
when we will add another folder of another month, we can set the field Month with
another value.
Now, once made the automatic indexing process it is time to do the manual process of
indexing, because now the fields Name and Surname are empty in each entry, like
in the Figure 9.3.3. To do this process, we could click on Edit in each row, but to do
it easily looking to the document in the same time, we have to click on Image view
and the system will show us a screen like in the Figure 9.3.4, where we can edit fields
and save them in while we are looking at the document in the same time.
Once we indexed all the entries, we will have a full table, and we can do quick
searching by using the tools of the web browser in the table view, in order to access
quickly to the information.

35

Figure 9.3.3: Table view

Figure 9.3.4: Image view

36