Table of Contents

Developing Methodology

As a low-code development library, the goal of the Wizard's Toolkit is to provide you a framework of PHP, SQL and JavaScript that work together to make developing data-driven websites easy and quick.

Once you have downloaded the library and deployed it to your server, all the basics should already be working. This includes ability for users to register, forgot-password feature, log in to a dashboard, and you have a back-office allowing you to manage users and their activity.

Being “low code” instead of “no code” means you have all the source code except our “saving data PHP” page which is encrypted. You can edit and change anything you like.

Enhancements

Our goal with enhancements is to always make everything backwards compatible. This is not always possible and we will document it on the few occasions when an update does change functionality but that should be rare. Most of the times updates will only include new features being added or additional optional parameters added to functions.

Designed for Minimal Changes

The library is designed in a way that your changes to make it work perfectly for your website or mobile app most likely will only need to be done in a few files. This way the hassle of integrating your changes into new download updates should be minimal. Most likely the only WTK files you will want to change are:

wtkServerInfo.php

This file will rarely change in the core Wizard's Toolkit. This is where you set all your server-specific information regarding website URL, database access configuration, preferred icons for add/edit/delete use, etc. When you first download Wizard's Toolkit you should make a lot of changes in this file. Then back it up and never overwrite it again with any future Wizard's Toolkit updates.

spa.htm or mpa.htm

These are the HTML templates which contain the HTML structure and framework for your website. It has @tokens@ in it which are replaced by data and paths you define in wtkServerInfo.php. If you are using Single Page App design then you will want to customize the spa.htm file for your needs. If you are using Multi Page App design then you will want to customize the mpa.htm file for your needs. You can use one of our many CSS files for choosing a color palette or use our CSS Maker to create your own.

wtkLibrary.js

This is a critical JavaScript file which handles much of the navigation and UIX via AJAX. This contains the functions for logging in, sending out forgotten passwords, navigating between pages, refreshing the dashboard, and so much more.

Because every website has different needs for their dashboard, it is likely you will want to modify wtkLibrary.js in small ways. For example changing access warnings based on user's security level or changing which PHP pages are called via AJAX for Dashboard Widget refreshing.

MaterializeCSS.php

This PHP page is the library of PHP functions for creating the HTML for form fields. Hopefully you will not need to edit this, but based on your HTML goals that is a possibility. If you are using a different HTML framework than MaterializeCSS then this would be the file to copy and modify. If you are using Bootstrap then email me and I will send a prior Bootstrap.php file which uses the same PHP function names but generates Bootstrap HTML instead of MaterializeCSS HTML.