Support & Troubleshooting FAQ

I am upgrading the software to a higher version. What to do in order not to loose data?

Read the ReadMe file first, to find specific upgrading information. In general, you should install the new script to a new directory. Make the setup and configuration of the new program so that it becomes fully functional. Then in the setup program, you can make a data transfer from the old installation to the new installation. After data transfer, test the system and check the integrity of your data. Then, you can delete the old installation and change the name of the directory of the new installation.

I am updating the software. What to do in order not to loose data and configuration info?

When you are updating the same version of the software, keep your current *cfg.pl files or *settings.pl files. All configuration is stored in those files. You can overwrite the other files with the new ones.

In the setup program, I am unable to save the database settings correctly since the page after save continues to display the default values.

All the settings are saved to *cfg.pl files. This error shows that the setup script can not write to those files. Please check the file permissions of the cfg files and the installation directory for write permission. Try higher permissions if a group write does not work. Unfortunately, hosting provides like to play with those script write permissions for some reason, so it is very common to find non-standard settings. The easy way of resolving this issue is to play with the permissions. If you have other scripts installed that works good, you may try the directory and file permissions of those scripts.

I noticed that the time on the script interface is 4 hours ahead of my time (Eastern Standard Time, USA). Why?

Well, that time is GMT, Greenwich Mean Time. GMT is the standard time unit of Internet. It is the same all over the world. When you consider that you may be from NewYork, your web hosting company may be located in Europe, and your visitors may be from Japan, It makes sense to use GMT as the time base. However, in the next version updates, we plan to give opportunity to set up a time offset for the display of the program.

I login to the admin panel successfully. But when I click any of the menu options it asks me to login again, giving the message "Your session is expired. Please login!" What is going on?

That means that login cookie is not delivered to the admin panel by your browser. Admin program saves the login information in a cookie in your browser. When the cookie expires, the admin panel can not find the login info and decides that the session is expired. There may be several reasons for this behavior:

Check the cookie settings of your browser. Cookies must be enabled.
You have a very small entry in "user inactivity timeout" setting in the "admin program settings" menu of the setup. If you can not proceed to this menu in the setup because of the same problem, you can find this setting in the file "xxxadmincfg.pl", the variable "$CfgAdm::UserExpireDuration". This setting determines the life time of the login cookie in the browser after every user action. If the value is small, such as 2 min, (the default value was 180 min, 3 hr) then your login cookie expires quickly. Please enter a value sufficiently high.
The clock of your web server is out of synchronization and late. This causes the login cookie to expire immediately. Either correct the clock of the server computer or enter a sufficiently high value to the variable mentioned in step 2 to compensate the time difference.
The clock of your local computer is out of synchronization and leading. This also causes the received cookie expire immediately. Either correct the clock of the computer or enter a sufficiently high value to the variable mentioned in step 2 to compensate the time difference.

When I try to obtain reports I get an SQL error stating "Got error 127 from table handler". Or sometimes I can not get any response at all.

Most probably your log tables are corrupted. Run the following command dynadmin.pl?repairtables=T in your browser to let dynadmin to execute the repair table command for all tables, before displaying the login prompt. Some times it may be necessary to execute the repair tables command several times.
You should regularly check the size of the log tables with your MySql control panel of your hosting account. If you do not have one, then you can use the table management menu of setup program or the purge menu of the admin program. If the size grows too much, purge some of the old records in the admin panel.

I am trying to rotate ads. But all I get is an ad of RobustHost instead of my ads. What is wrong?

When DynAds delivery engine can not find something to deliver, it sends the default ad to the browser. The RobustHost ad you saw is the default "default ad". You can change it in the setup program "ad delivery settings" menu for versions having a setup program. In TDB version 2.05, change the $gDefaultHtml variable in ad-settings.pl file.

Why does the ad delivery engine not find any ad to serve you? Most probably there is no ad placed into the ad group you are trying to pull the ads from. Or all of the ads in the ad group are disabled.

When I click to an ad, It redirects to RobustHost.com home page. What is wrong?

When DynAds re-direction engine can not find the destination url for the ad, it redirects to the default page. RobustHost home page is the default "default page". You can change it in the "ad delivery engine settings" menu of the setup program. Or in the TDB version 2.05, change the $gDefaultPage variable in ad-settings.pl file.

Why does the ad delivery engine not find any destination url for the ad clicked?

If one of the ad, category or account (ad, campaign, or account in Dynads Pro) is disabled, then the default link is used.
If you are using IMG tag to display banners, then the ad identification is saved in a cookie in the browser. If your browser does not accept cookies, then the destination ad can not be identified and the default link is used. In addition, you should define the "Redirection URL" field of the ad. If it is empty, redirection to the default page occurs.

I only have one MySql database in my account. I want to learn the table names of DynAds in order to check if there are any conflicting names. Where are the table names?

See the file xxxsharedcfg.pl for the database tables names. It is very unlikely to have a conflict. All table names of DynAds starts with a special phrase, like "da210".

Do you have a quick tutorial for adding embedded Flash ads?

See Flash Ads tutorial.

How can I add more ad types in DynAds?

Open the xxxadmincfg.pl file for MySql versions and ad-settings.pl file for TDB versions. Then edit the AdTypeList variable.

I am installing the text database version V2.05. I am very confused about the database directory. Admin panel says "user database is not accessible".

The default name for the database directory is "data". With the default installation settings, the "data" directory must be in the installation directory. However you can open it anywhere you like. Then you have to change the database directory setting $gAdDir in ad-settings.pl file and user database setting $gUserDBName in user-setting.pl file to reflect the new "data" path. For example if you opened the "data" directory as "/xyz/data", then $gAdDir should be "/xyz/data/" and $gUserDBName should be "/xyz/data/user.tdb". Assign write permission to the database directory so that the script can write into it. Do not create any files in the database directory. The script creates files automatically.

I am installing the text database version 2.05. Where to setup Admin user name/password?

Open user-settings.pl file, change the $gUserSUName and $gUserSUInitPass variables for user name and password, respectively.