GameDB2 User Manual - System Configuration

Description


Many aspects of how GameDB operates, where it stores it files, and other things are controlled by the GameDB system configuration options. These options are split into three different types:

Per-user Configuration


Every user in GameDB has access to Per-User configuration options. These options are accessible by clicking "Configuration" in the GameDB main menu. These options control how some aspects of GameDB will behave for this particular user. Changing your user settings does not affect any other user in the system.

The currently available options are:

System Configuration


Along with the Per User configuration options, there are also several configuration options which control various aspects of GameDB's operation for all users. Changing these settings will affect everyone other user in the system.

The system configuration options are split out into logical groups:

System configuration properties


This section provides some basic system configuration settings which control what information is presented to you by GameDB, and how that information is displayed.

Paths for internal GameDB files


This section provides information about where some of the static files that GameDB needs to run are installed. These are files which cannot be installed into the same location as the actual GameDB installation due to web server requirements.

Automatic page generation


This section provides some default configuration options for the Automatic Page Generation system in GameDB. This allows you to configure GameDB to generate pages for most of the information available to the system.

When configured, these pages are automatically generated from Template files that you provide, which give the pages their layout and structure.

The options provided here set the default options. Each of these options may be overridden on a template by template basis.

Uploaded game image configuration


This section provides some configuration options which specify where GameDB should store images for games when they are uploaded. This is used by GameDB to not only store the files, but also generate URL's for the images whenever it wants to display an image, or when generating pages with the automatic page generator.

External helper programs


This section provides the locations to some external programs that GameDB needs in order to operate properly.

In general, all of the fields here should be a complete path to the executable in question, unless that location is currently set in the system's executable path. Normally it is best to not rely on this behavior, as most web servers keep the path very restrictive for security reasons.

Extended Game Fields


GameDB supports some extended information for games, including price and stock information. Though these fields are always stored and maintained, configuration options are presented to turn on and off the controls that allow you to view and modify the associated data.

Usually, this information is only of interest when GameDB is being used as the back end of a commercial game website, and it allows you to track costs for games, items sold and other such information. However, this information could also be used for other purposes by individuals or game groups.

The following is a list of all of the extended fields that are currently supported, along with some possible uses for these fields. At the moment, the only operations allowed on the fields is to display the information, change it, and use it when generating pages with the automatic page generation system.

The list mentions several possible uses to help spark ideas for what you could use this information for, or for new functions/data fields to include.