FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS (FAQs)

- # Installation

  - What are the correct permission settings for phpESP files?
  - I'm getting an error that says PHP is running in a unsupported mode.
  - Can I disable authentication for the management interface?
  - Does register globals need to be on?
  - I'm running Windows and keep getting a blank screen - Help!
  - Where do I set the MySQL login passwords?
  - Does phpESP support databases other than MySQL?
  - I'm having trouble changing the default language, what should I do?

- # Survey Management

  - Can I delete old surveys?
  - How can I display only 1 question per page?
  - Can I change the number of options on a rank question?
  - Can I prevent multiple votes (ballot stuffing)?
  - Can I limit the number of times someone takes a survey if they have to login?
  - Can a respondent complete part of a survey, log out, then log back in later to finish?

- # Survey Deployment

  - What are handler.php and phpESP.first.php, and how do I use them?
  - How do I publish survey results?

- # General Questions

  - Can phpESP support large numbers of respondents?

- # Installation

  What are the correct permission settings for phpESP files?

  In a Unix environment, phpESP files should be set as 644 to be readable by Apache. For tighter security, phpESP.ini.php should be set 640, owner root and it's group set to the Apache process's group.

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  I'm getting an error that says PHP is running in a unsupported mode.

  This error is an indication that your web server is running PHP in CGI mode instead of SAPI. phpESP can function in this configuration but authentication must be disabled. (See disabling authentication in this FAQ.) (See the PHP manual for more information on CGI VS SAPI.)

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  Can I disable authentication for the management interface?

  Authentication can be disabled by setting auth_design to false in phpESP.ini.php. Warning, makeing this change could pose a security risk.
  Change this:
  `$ESPCONFIG['auth_response'] = true;`
  and `$ESPCONFIG['auth_design'] = true;`
  To this:
  `$ESPCONFIG['auth_response'] = false;`

  and `$ESPCONFIG['auth_design'] = false;`
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  Does register globals need to be on?

  No.

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  I'm running Windows and keep getting a blank screen - Help!

  If is is not a path problem in phpESP.ini.php, then copy gnu_gettext.dll (or libintl-1.dll) and php_gettext.dll (both usually found in the PHP install directory) into the system directory of windows. For Win95/98 the system directory is something like `c:\windows\system` and on WinNT/2000/XP the system directory is something like `c:\windows\system32`.
  After you have copied these dll's to the proper place, edit your php.ini file and comment out the line "extension=php_gettext.dll".
  Then stop and restart the web server.

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  Where do I set the MySQL login password?

  The MySQL server name, user, and password that phpESP will use are set in the file phpESP.ini.php -- further details are in the INSTALL file.

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  Does phpESP support databases other than MySQL?

  As of version 1.7 database abstraction has been implemented using the ADOdb library. MySQL is the most fully tested, Postgres has not been fully tested and SQLite has some known issues. We would welcome help makeing Postgres and SQLite support as strong as MySQL.

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  I'm having trouble changing the default language, what should I do?

  Check the results of the phpESP system test page, then see the TRANSLATIONS file.

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- # Survey Management

  Can I delete old surveys?

  Yes, there is an unlisted function http://......./phpESP/admin/manage.php?where=purge
  Be very careful when using it, you cannot recover from it.

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  How can I display only 1 question per page?

  You can put a section break between each question to emulate this behavior.

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  Can I change the number of options on a rank question?

  Yes, change the length field.

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  Can I prevent multiple votes (ballot stuffing)?

  Well, if you give each respondent a username and password and have them login, you can limit multiple voting. If you don't force respondents to log in, it becomes more difficult (e.g., you could analyze the data by IP.)

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  Can I limit the number of times someone takes a survey if they have to login?

  Yes, set max login to the number of times you want to allow someone to take the survey. This may be done from the Survey Access page.

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  Can a respondent complete part of a survey, log out, then log back in later to finish?

  Yes, see the Save/Restore option on the Survey Access page.

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- # Survey Deployment

  What are handler.php and phpESP.first.php, and how do I use them?

  They are used to embed a survey in another block of html/php code. You should always include phpESP.first.php at the top of your html code, before any output begins. Look at the examples in the example dir for usage.

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  How do I publish survey results?

  You can make public results by doing the following, though note that it will make all results public. Make a copy of public/survey.php then edit your copy to uncomment approximately on line 48:
  `//$results = 1;`
  then use your copied/edited page just like the survey.php page. It should then display results instead of the survey. The same applies to custom survey templates, setting $results to one before calling handler.php will switch to results mode.

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- # General Questions

  Can phpESP support large numbers of respondents?

  Yes, large surveys (100 questions) and large respondent groups (4,000+) can be handled without a problem. Throughput issues are generally a function of the speed of the web server, the speed of the MySQL server, and available network bandwidth.

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