doc/db-backend.txt

   1 $Id$
   2
   3
   4 Storing private addressbooks and preferences in a database
   5 ==========================================================
   6
   7
   8 On sites with many users you might want to store your user data in a
   9 database instead of in files. This document describes how to configure
  10 SquirrelMail to do this.
  11
  12 Methods for storing both personal addressbooks and user preferences in
  13 a database is included as a part of the distribution.
  14
  15
  16
  17 Configuring PEAR DB
  18 -------------------
  19
  20 For this to work you must have the PEAR classes installed, these are
  21 part of PHP. Once these are installed you must have sure the directory
  22 containg them is a part of your PHP include path. See the PHP
  23 documentation for information on how to do that.
  24 Under Mandrake Linux the PEAR classes are installed as part of the
  25 php-devel package and under FreeBSD they are installed as part of
  26 the mod_php4 or php4 port/package. I'm afraid I have no information on
  27 other systems at the present time.
  28
  29
  30 Configuring addressbooks in database
  31 ------------------------------------
  32
  33 First you need to create a database and a table to store the data in.
  34 Create a database user with access to read and write in that table.
  35
  36 For MySQL you would normally do something like:
  37
  38  (from the command line)
  39  # mysqladmin create squirrelmail
  40
  41  (from the mysql client)
  42  mysql> GRANT select,insert,update,delete ON squirrelmail.*
  43               TO squirreluser@localhost IDENTIFIED BY 'sqpassword';
  44
  45 The table structure should be similar to this (for MySQL):
  46
  47    CREATE TABLE address (
  48      owner varchar(128) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  49      nickname varchar(16) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  50      firstname varchar(128) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  51      lastname varchar(128) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  52      email varchar(128) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  53      label varchar(255),
  54      PRIMARY KEY (owner,nickname),
  55      KEY firstname (firstname,lastname)
  56    );
  57
  58 and similar to this for PostgreSQL:
  59 CREATE TABLE "address" (
  60    "owner" varchar(128) NOT NULL,
  61    "nickname" varchar(16) NOT NULL,
  62    "firstname" varchar(128) NOT NULL,
  63    "lastname" varchar(128) NOT NULL,
  64    "email" varchar(128) NOT NULL,
  65    "label" varchar(255) NOT NULL,
  66    CONSTRAINT "address_pkey" PRIMARY KEY ("nickname", "owner")
  67 );
  68 CREATE  UNIQUE INDEX "address_firstname_key" ON "address"
  69    ("firstname", "lastname");
  70
  71
  72 Next, edit your configuration so that the address book DSN (Data Source
  73 Name) is specified, this can be done using either conf.pl or via the
  74 administration plugin. The DSN should look something like:
  75
  76  mysql://squirreluser:sqpassword@localhost/squirrelmail or
  77  pgsql://squirreluser:sqpassword@localhost/squirrelmail
  78
  79 From now on all users' personal addressbooks will be stored in a
  80 database.
  81
  82 Global address book uses same table format as the one used for personal
  83 address book. You can even use same table, if you don't have user named
  84 'global'.
  85
  86 Configuring preferences in database
  87 -----------------------------------
  88
  89 This is done in much the same way as it is for storing your address
  90 books in a database.
  91
  92 The table structure should be similar to this (for MySQL):
  93
  94   CREATE TABLE userprefs (
  95     user varchar(128) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  96     prefkey varchar(64) DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  97     prefval BLOB DEFAULT '' NOT NULL,
  98     PRIMARY KEY (user,prefkey)
  99   );
 100
 101 and for PostgreSQL:
 102 CREATE TABLE "userprefs" (
 103    "username" varchar(128) NOT NULL,
 104    "prefkey" varchar(64) NOT NULL,
 105    "prefval" text,
 106    CONSTRAINT "userprefs_pkey" PRIMARY KEY ("prefkey", "username")
 107 );
 108
 109 Next, edit your configuration so that the preferences DSN (Data Source
 110 Name) is specified, this can be done using either conf.pl or via the
 111 administration plugin. The DSN should look something like:
 112
 113  mysql://squirreluser:sqpassword@localhost/squirrelmail or
 114  pgsql://squirreluser:sqpassword@localhost/squirrelmail
 115
 116 From now on all users' personal preferences will be stored in a
 117 database.
 118
 119 Default preferences can be set by altering the $default array in
 120 db_prefs.php.
 121
 122 Troubleshooting
 123 ---------------
 124 1. Oversized field values. Preferences are not/can't be saved
 125
 126 Database fields have size limits. Preference table example sets 128
 127 character limit to owner field, 64 character limit to preference key
 128 field and 64KB (database BLOB field size) limit to value field.
 129
 130 If interface tries to insert data without checking field limits, it
 131 can cause data loss or database errors. Table information functions
 132 provided by Pear DB libraries are not accurate and some database
 133 backends don't support them. Since 1.5.1 SquirrelMail provides
 134 configuration options that set allowed field sizes.
 135
 136 If you see oversized field errors in your error logs - check your
 137 database structure. Issue can be solved by increasing database field
 138 sizes.
 139
 140 If you want to get more debugging information - check setKey() function
 141 in dbPrefs class. Class is stored in functions/db_prefs.php