The administration section of your Olate Download system can be accessed by going to admin.php. So for example, if your system is installed at http://www.example.com/upload then you would go to http://www.example.com/upload/admin.php to access to rhe admin control panel.

The admin control panel of your site is available by browsing to the directory where you installed OD and going to the admin.php file. You then need to log in with the username and password you entered on installing Olate Download.

The General Settings tab is in the main section of the admin control panel. It contains options that affect the entire site. This help page will go through the individual options contained in the General Settings tab and explain their use and effect on the site.

The text entered in the site name box is used as the title for most pages. It does not appear on the actual site but is shown in the browser title bar, at the very top of the window.

The base url is the location where a browser would access to view the Olate Download site. Although the copy of Olate Download may be installed in the /home/example/public_html/upload directory of the server and your domain name is example.com it would be accessible to the internet through the domain http://www.example.com/upload - this is the base URL. If the Base URL is not set correctly internal links within the site will not work as they will be pointing to the wrong location. Normally, it will be autodetected during this step and must have a trailing slash.

The administrative e-mail receives all mail generated by the report problem dialog on the site. When a user finds a problem with a file they have the option to click on the report problem. They then can then fill in the details of the problem, which are mailed to this admin address.

The flood interval is the amount of time after submitting a problem the user must wait before another problem can be submitted. This prevents large amounts of spam being sent to the admin e-mail address using the report problem dialog.

This setting changes the language of the menus throughout the site.

The date format is the way in which dates are displayed on the Olate Download site. For example the setting d/m/Y would display the 31st of August 2004 as 31/08/04. Whereas m/d/Y would display it as 08/31/04.

The complete list of available characters for use is available here (Table 1).

The file size format changes the unit the Olate Download site displays file sizes in. This value will be used throughout the site. Using the Automatically Select setting will cause Olate Download to choose the most suitable format to display the file size in.

The number of mirrors option changes the amount of separate download locations you are allowed to add for a file upon creation/editing.

This option changes the amount of separate files for download that will be displayed on a single website page. This means that if the value is set at 10 and there are 12 files to display the first 10 will be displayed on the first page and the last 2 on a separate page. The links to the separate pages are generated and displayed automatically. This value also sets the number of search results and comments displayed per page.

This option, if checked, allows users to post comments and feelings on a particular file. These comments are displayed on that file's web page, which other users can then read.

This option, when checked, requires all comments to be approved by an admin before they are displayed on the site. This allows admins to stop any comments that they feel should not be shown on their site. Admins can view and edit comments waiting for approval, by going to the admin panel and clicking on Approve Comments in the files section.

This option, if checked, allows users to rate each file. Olate Download then automatically calculates the files average rating and this is displayed for other users to view. A user is only allowed to vote once per file.

This option, when checked, allows Olate Download to gather and store data about a file's downloads. Timestamp, IP, referrer and user agent are stored for each individual download in the database.

This option, when ticked, allows RDF Site Summary. RSS streams can be used to display information about downloads on other websites. More information about RSS is available here.

Disabled by default, enabling this option will allow visitors to add/upload their own files to your website. Once ticked, an option will appear on the menu which links to userupload.php.

This setting allows you to choose whether users can physically upload files through the userupload.php interface. If it is unchecked, the option to do so will not be shown.

Similarly to the previous setting, it is possible to remove the ability to add files with mirrors through userupload.php.

By enabling this setting, all files added through userupload.php will be marked as approved automatically, removing the need for you to manually approve them.

Note: If you check this box, you open your installation of Olate Download to potential abuse from people adding files you don't want. While we recommend you keep this disabled, it makes your life easier if you are using Olate Download in an internal environment where all the users of it are trusted to use it properly.

The allowed upload extensions allows you to define what file types may be uploaded through the User Upload feature. This helps to keep your site secure by only allowing certain filetypes. You specify each filetype in the field (e.g .exe or .zip) and separate each one with a comma and no space.

For example: .exe,.zip,.avi,.gif

If you enable this setting, file uploads done through the Admin Control Panel will have their extensions checked against the list you have specified in the Allowed upload extensions setting.

This setting controls whether the WYSIWYG editor (FCKeditor) is used on the File and Agreement Add/Edit pages.

Olate Download stores the date new files are added and displays the newest files on a Latest Files page. This option changes the amount of files that are shown on this page. If the option is set to 2, the newest 2 files will be shown; if set to 5, the newest 5 files will be shown.

Olate Download stores the amount of downloads each file receives. The files with the highest amount of downloads, are shown together on the Top Downloads page. This option sets the amount of files that will be included and shown on that page.

This will enable or disable the Top x Files display option which appears in the top menu and is controlled by the option shown below.

Enable or disable the All Files link and display mode.

This option, when ticked, allows users to run searches for files containing the key words that they have entered in the search field.

Enabled by default, the count will show how many files are within a child category next to the category name in the user front end.

This option activates a filter on the category menu which only displays categories that have files in them (or in any sub-categories).

This setting enables or disables the Recommend to a friend module. If enabled, a link to this module is displayed in the File Details page.

Enabling this setting provides some degree of spam-proofing, however it isn't possible to fully achieve this. Normally when someone submits a recommendation, it is sent to the recipient straight away, but by enabling this setting you add a layer of protection to the module by requiring the sender to confirm their address by clicking a link in the email sent to them.

The Update Settings button allows you to save and make effective the settings you have entered on the General Settings page. If you leave the page without updating the settings any modifications you have made will be lost.

Olate Download has been written with security in mind and is continually updated to ensure that security risks are kept to a minimum. Aside from the code itself, Olate Download includes several security tools which allow you to keep your files and website safe.

• File Uploads - These are inherently risky because you are allowing your users to upload files to your web server. To ensure this is kept secure, OD3 implements a whitelist for file extensions and requires by default that file uploads be approvaled before being visible on your site.
• IP Address Restriction - You may have problems with certain users accessing your website when you do not want them to. As such, OD3 includes a feature to block IP addresses.
• Leech Protection - This allows you to stop visitors from going directly to your files. There are also options to specifically allow or block certain referring websites.

File uploads are inherently risky because you are allowing your users to upload files to your web server. To ensure this is kept secure, OD3 implements a whitelist for file extensions where you must specify which file extensions you wish your users to be able to upload. Only those in the list can actually be uploaded. You specify each filetype in the field (e.g .exe or .zip) and separate each one with a comma and no space.

For example: .exe,.zip,.avi,.gif

In addition, any files that are uploaded are renamed with a random filename prepended to the original filename. This means that a user cannot upload a file, then guess the location and access the file.

Finally, all files that are uploaded must be approved by the administrator before they appear on the main website. Pending files are listed in the “Approve Files” section.

This allows you allow/deny access to the list of addresses you specify. As well as just handling single IP addresses, you can specify an range of IP addresses or even a whole network (there are two ways: 192.168.0.0/255.255.255.0 and 192.168.0.0/24). This allows you to lock down your download system to prevent unauthorised access. You can also enter an IP address and the system will tell you whether it is allowed or denied access, and the entries in the database that cause this.

Restrictions are listed at the bottom of the IP Address Restriction page and there is the “Test an IP address” box mentioned above. You can enable/disable/edit/delete multiple entries at once.

Leech protection is difficult to handle 100% when the files are stored on a publicaly accessible server. However, Olate Download has built in some extra protection and also provides a sample leech protection tool if you are running the Apache web server.

With Leech Protection enabled from the General Settings page, every visitor must view the Details page for each file before they can download it. If they go directly to the file download page they are redirected to the details page first.

You can however specify certain referring URLs which will be allowed to bypass this protection, for example if a partner site is linking directly to your files. Equally, you can specifically block referring websites to prvent them from leeching your files.

To add a certain domain, you enter that domain into the relevant box under Always Allow or Always Deny and click Add. You can delete or swap an existing entry to the other box by selecting it and clicking the relevant arrows or delete icon.

Note: that when adding domain names to the leech protection lists, they can only consist of letters (a-z), numbers (0-9), a minus sign (-) and an asterisk chatacter (*) which is a wildcard

You can enhance the above protection by using the sample .htaccess file provided. This is for use with the Apache webserver only and will help to prevent leeching of your files.

You will need to edit the file, located in the download package under the tools/leech_protection directory, to include your domain name and the file extensions you wish to protect.

Copy the file into your OD3 directory (e.g. upload/) and then upload to your website. You do not need to do anything else - leech protection is automatically enabled.

If you wish to create the .htaccess file yourself, the code is:

## Leech Protection ##
 
# Replace the domain on both lines with your domain
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://yoursite.com/ [NC]
RewriteCond %{HTTP_REFERER} !^http://www.yoursite.com/ [NC]
RewriteRule [^/]+.(gif|jpg|exe|zip|rar|tar|gz)$ - [F]
# Add your own file extensions above

Categories organise your files into handy groups and allow the users of your site to browse your files with ease and speed. All files available for public download must be put into a category.

Olate Download provides a range of simple tools to help you create, modify and delete categories. These tools are available through your admin control panel.

In order to create a new category you need to log into your admin control panel with the information you entered on set up. From there you need to click on the Add a New Category link in the catagories tab.

The text you enter in the name field will be used to identify the category when you later go to add files to it or edit or delete it. It is also displayed by that name on the main site.

The text you enter in the description field will be shown on the main site when the user hovers over the category name to advise users about what sort of files are in the category.

The parent category combo box selects if the category will be made a stand-alone category or a sub category of a larger category. Sub categories are only displayed when the user clicks on the parent category.

To make the new category a stand-alone category, select none from the combo box. To make the new category a sub category of another parent category select the parent category from the combo box.

The contents of this field will be placed into a <meta type=“keywords”> tag in the header of the page.

You can choose in which order the categories are displayed on the page by altering this value. They will be displayed in ascending order so setting a value of 1 will make that category appear before a category with the order value of 2.

To save the category simply click the add button at the bottom of the page. This will add the new category to the main site with the details you have filled in. If you leave the page without clicking Add, the category will not be added and the data you have entered will be lost.

Editing a category is done in much the same way as adding one. To begin you need to click the Edit An Existing Category link in the categories tab. You then need to select the category you want to edit from the combo box and click Edit.

At the next page you will be shown the details of the category. Simply click in the appropriate field you wish to change and make the modification. Clicking Edit saves these changes. If you leave the page without clicking Edit, the category will not be added and the data you have entered will be lost.

To delete a category simply click the Delete an Existing Category link in the category tab. Simply select the category you wish to delete and press the Delete button. Be warned, once a category is deleted, it cannot be recovered. The delete category command will not work unless the category is empty. However, if the category still contains files and you try to delete it, you will be given the option to move those files to a different category.

If you wish to alter the ordering of all the categories in one go, you can use the Alter Category Ordering option. This lists all the categories and one level of children for you to alter the ordering of. If the child categories have children themselves, you can click on their name to view those sub children.

Every download you make available can be managed through the admin tools available to you under the Files heading in the admin control panel.

To add a new file, you can click the Add A New File link from the left admin menu or use the quick Add File link from the top blue menu bar.

This is the name that will appear on the main index. It is user searchable.

This description appears on the index and when browsing the categories. It should be a short, concise description of the file. This field will accept HTML, will convert line breaks and is also user searchable.

This description appears when the user clicks to view more details about a specific file. This field will accept HTML, will convert line breaks and is also user searchable.

You can select for the file to be a member of one category or child category. This is selectable from the drop down menu. You can also choose for this file not to belong to a category - the file will be private and will not be listed on the index, nor will it be searchable. The only way to view this file is via the direct link to the details.php page.

If you would like to start the download count at something other than 0, you can change the value in this field.

If you wish to specify a file size, enter into this field in the format you selected from the General Settings screen.

If you would like the user to accept a license agreement before being able to download the file, you can specify one you have already created using the drop down menu. The user will be shown this agreement when they try to download the file, which they must agree to prior to being provided with the file.

To password protect viewing and downloading of the file, enter a password into this box. Your users must then enter this password before being able to view or download the file. Leaving the field blank will disable the password protection or leave the password how it is set (if you are editing a file).

Instead of the using the file mirrors, you can upload the file from your PC. When adding a file, tick the box marked Upload file? and when you are finished with the file details, click Add. You will then be taken to a separate page to allow you to upload the file.

Note: When adding a file, you cannot use both mirrors and file upload, however, if you wish to add a mirror as well as uploading the file, once the new file has been added, you can add additional mirrors through the Edit Existing File page (see below).

Any custom fields you have added will appear to allow you to specify a value. If you chose a default value, that is shown. If you do not wish to use the custom field for this file, leave the field blank (or make it blank if you have a default value).

Olate Download 3 supports unlimited download mirrors. The default number shown on the File Addition/Editing pages is set to 5, however this can be changed through the General Settings page. Enter a name for the mirror, the physical location (e.g. London, England) and the download URL. If you enter only 1 mirror, the user will be directed to it immediately, otherwise the list of mirrors will be presented for the user to choose.

Any file can be edited by selecting the Edit An Existing File option from the left admin menu. You will be shown a list of all the downloads. Clicking the name of the file will take you to the edit page.

All the fields are the same as when you added the file (above) except for several additional fields explained below.

When adding a file, the date is automatically generated. However, you can edit this date by editing the box when editing a file. You must make sure you use the format dd/mm/yyyy. For example, 24/09/2004

You can choose to set a file to disabled. Once this is set, it will not appear on the main site and cannot be accessed at all. This is the default setting for all files added by users.

The download mirrors are listed here. To edit the mirrors, alter the relevant fields then click the Edit button at the bottom of the page. Checking the Delete? box will cause that mirror to be removed when you click the Edit button.

The comments posted for this file are listed below the Download Locations and can be edited or deleted using the link on the bottom information bar for each one.

To delete a file, simply select the Delete An Existing File from the left menu. You will be shown a list of all the downloads including some additional information. Clicking the name of the file will delete that file including all comments associated with it.

You can add multiple files at once by using the mass_add.php file. This lists all the files in a specified directory and then allows you to edit the details for each one before adding them all to the site. In addition, you can select to extract ID3 (www.id3.org) data from any media files you have uploaded.

Copy the mass_add.php file and the getid3/ directory (if you wish to use the ID3 features) into your OD3 directory (e.g. upload/) and then upload to your website. Using your web browser, browse to the location of the page and follow the on screen instructions.

e.g. if you uploaded the upload/ directory to /downloads, you would browse to http://www.example.com/downloads/mass_add.php

Once you have finished, delete the file from your site.

You can find out more about the ID3 class used in the getid3/ directory by viewing the .txt files.

When a user goes to download a file he/she may have to accept a set of terms and conditions to download the file. The user is shown the agreement and has to click Accept to continue on to download the file.

The agreements are set by the admin from the user control panel and are applied to files when creating them for display on the main site.

To create a new user agreement you need to log into the admin control panel with an administrative account. From there find and click the Add A New Agreement link in the Files section.

The text you enter in the name field will be used to identify the agreement you are about to create. You will use this name to select the agreement for files later.

The contents field will contain the text that is displayed to the user as the agreement. This box should contain the body of your terms and conditions for the download.

Once you have finished entering the data click the Add button to save the agreement to the database. If you leave the page without clicking the Add button the information you have entered will be lost.

Editing a user agreement couldn't be simpler. You simply click the Edit An Existing Agreement link in the files tab and select the name of the agreement you wish to modify.

Once you have clicked the Edit button you will be shown the current information for that agreement. Simply make the changes you want and click the Edit button to save them. If you leave the page without clicking Edit your changes will be lost.

To delete a user agreement click the Delete An Existing Agreement link in the files tab and select the agreement you wish to delete from the combo box. Once you click Delete the agreement selected will be deleted. Be warned, the agreements are not recoverable after deletion.

If some files are still using the agreement it will not be deleted. You will need to unassign the agreement from the files before it can be deleted..

Visitors can add comments about the files available on your website.

If you have the Comments Require Approval option enabled in the General Settings, any comments submitted by visitors will not display on the file details page until they have been approved.

On the Admin Index page, you can see at a glance how many comments are currently pending approval. Clicking the counter will take you to the queue management page to allow you to view the list of comments currently pending review.

Clicking on the Approve link will immediately mark the comment viewable. It will then appear on the file details page for visitors to see.

Clicking Edit will allow you to alter the contents of the comment.

Deleting a comment will remove it from the database totally.

You can manage all the comments in the database from the Manage Comments page. This can also be reached by clicking on the Total Comments link on the admin index page.

From this page, you must define the terms for your search - comment ID, file, date (in the format dd/mm/yyyy), poster name, poster e-mail address and the status of the comment. Once you are happy with your terms, click on Search.

The results of your search are shown in a table. You can select as many comments as you wish by ticking the box on the left. You then choose what you wish to do with them from the action drop down menu. You can either Delete, Unapprove or Approve the comments. Editing can only be done individually by clicking on the Edit link on the right.

When editing a file, you can see a list of approved comments for that file when viewing the Edit File page. The same options as above are available on this page, however, unapproved comments are not displayed.

Added in version 3.2.0, custom fields allow you to include additional information for a file. You can specify a default value and then edit the value for different files. You get the option to edit the custom field when you add or edit a file.

When you add a custom field, you will be asked for a label and for an optional default value. The label is what will appear on when the file is viewed along with the value specified when you add or edit the field. The default value will appear by default when editing or adding a file but you can edit it if you wish.

Clicking on Edit Custom Fields will display a list of all the custom fields you currently have. Click the name to edit that field.

Clicking on Delete Custom Fields will display a list of all the custom fields you currently have. Click the name to delete that field.

Olate Download 3 includes a basic user management tool which enables you to add new administrative users. Each user belongs to a user group which has specific permissions to allow access (or disallow access) to specific sections of the admin control panel.

Select the Add A New User from the left menu to create a new user account.

Specify a username and password for the user. Also enter an e-mail address and then select the user group you wish the user to belong to. The user group determines the user permissions.

Any optional information you wish to provide can also be entered. At present, this information is not used with the default template, however, it can easily be added and may be used in future versions.

Clicking on Edit An Existing User will display a list of users currently in the system. Clicking on the username will display the edit user page which shows the same information as the Add User page.

As with Edit An Existing User, when clicking the Delete User link, a list of users will be displayed. Clicking the username will remove that user from the system.

User groups allow you to assign certain permissions to a group of users. These permissions control access to certain sections of the control panel.

Adding a new group requires just the name. You can either edit the group's permissions on this page, or once the group is created. Ticking the box next to the permission name will grant access to that specific page of the admin control panel.

On the Edit Group page, you can either edit the name, or update any permissions that were set while creating the group.

When you click Delete Existing Group, a list of groups in the system will be displayed. Clicking the name will delete that group.