How to Use Dolphin Administration Area

The Dolphin administration area can be opened by adding the admin string in the end of the web site URL (for example: http://yourdomainname.com/Dolphin/admin/).

On the next screen you will be prompted to enter the license number. This will allow you to remove the BoonEx links and logo from your web site. Otherwise, you can continue using the unregistered copy.

The Dolphin software admin area comes with various features.

The most important of them will be described in our Dolphin tutorial.

Dashboard

The default area which loads after the entrance in the admin area is called Dashboard.

In this section you can view statistics about the number of members and friends, online members, new members for a defined period of time, number of photos, music, videos and profile videos. Also there you will find the number of posts, tags, events, blogs, groups, topics, articles, polls and classifieds. You can moderate them.

Scrolling down the page you will find the latest available version of the script and the one of your installation. If there is a difference you will know that the time for an upgrade has come.

Additionally, you will see links to important Dolphin resources and the News feed published by the script developers.

Users

The section, located below, is called Users.

It is divided in 3 areas.

Members

In the Members area you can see the list with the registered members, add new members' profiles and search in the existing ones. Further, you can delete, approve, activate, ban and unban profiles. You can confirm e-mails and send messages to members.

Affiliates

In the Affiliates area you can find the list of your partners.

You can manage them, add new affiliates, define their commission, make members your partners. Also, you can add and manage affiliates approved banners.

Moderators

The last area in this section is called Moderators.

There you can add and manage moderators' accounts for your community web site.

Content

The next section is called Content.

In the Photos area you can manage the pictures uploaded and shared by the web site members.

The Videos and the Music areas provide similar management tools for video and music files.

In the Profile Photos area you will find pictures that are waiting moderation. In this way you can prevent publishing of unsuitable pictures.

The Blogs area allows the site administrators to check and moderate the posts uploaded by the web site members.

Next, in the Profile Videos area you can manage the videos uploaded by the members in their profiles.

In the Profile Music area you can perform the same actions for the music files.

The Events area allows you to manage the events created by the members and the administrators. You can view, edit and delete events' participants.

In the Groups area you can manage the categories and the associated groups. You can add new categories, rename and delete the existing ones.

The Profile Backgrounds area allows you to post-moderate pictures uploaded by the members for their profile background.

The members of your web site can create polls and through the Polls area you can moderate them.

In the Classifieds area you can manage the corresponding categories.

In the Feedback area you can view, activate, edit and delete the members feedback.

Tools

The next section in the row is called Tools.

The Mass Mailer tool allows you to add and send mass mail to your web site members.

The Money Calculator tool provides you with detailed information about the web site income. It shows the list of the transactions.

The Database Backup functionality allows you to create regular backups of your web site database.

Through the Admin Polls tool you can add new polls and manage existing ones.

Using the Links Page option you can set the links published on your links pages.

The Admin Articles tool allows you to create, modify and publish articles on your Dolphin web site.

The Site News functionality gives you the ability to add, activate, edit and delete news from the corresponding section in your web site.

In the Random Quotes area you can manage the quotes that will appear randomly on the index page.

The Banners tool allows you to manage the banners which are visualized on your web site.

In the Modules area you can manage and configure integrated modules.

Plugins

Here we will describe the options included in the Plugins section.

There are two plugins included by default in the Dolphin application.

The first one is Ray Suite. It opens the Ray Community Widget Suite administration panel.

The widgets included in this suite are an audio and video chat, a desktop tool, a messenger, a music player, a shoutbox, a video player, a video recorder, a web presence tool, a whiteboard and a pMusic player. After the applications installations you should register them.

You will need to alter the file permissions of xml files and the files subfolder. You will be instructed by each widget which files and subdirectory to modify. Detailed instructions on how to change the file permissions can be found in our cPanel tutorial.

Additionally you can purchase and install different Flash applications like from the Add Flash Apps area.

Please note that some applications require an active link to an external Ray Multimedia Server. If you have an access to such a server, you can enter the connection details in the Settings tab.

The other plugin is the Orca Forum.

This is an interactive forum script integrated in the Dolphin application.

Builders

Next, we will proceed with the review of the Builders section. It consists of 3 tools.

The first one is called Fields Builder. Using it you can modify the Join Form fields. In the Edit Profile section you can manage different items for different account types: owner, moderator and admin. The View Profile section allows you to manage the corresponding fields for the following account types: admin, member, moderator, visitor. In the last area, named Search Profiles you can set the fields for simple, quick and advanced searches.

The second tool is named Navigation Menu Builder. It is used to manage the items set in your top menu.

Pages Builder is the third tool. There you can compose and manage different blocks for the web site's pages.

Settings

The next section is called Settings.

There you can manage the system settings for your Dolphin software.

First you can change the administrator password from the Admin Password area. Next, you can manage the Basic Settings like the site's main logo, the promo blocks and the index page setup.

In the Advanced Settings area you can fine tune your Dolphin installation by enabling and disabling various options.

The Email Templates tool allows you to set different templates for the e-mail messages which will be sent to the web site members based on their actions and requirements.

In the Language Settings area you can manage the installed languages. You can compile the language files, set the default one, assign flags and search for strings.

The Membership Levels area allows you to manage the different types of members accounts. You can allow certain actions to be performed based on the members profiles. You can open the web site in a free mode or enable a promotional membership plan.

The CSS Style Editor gives you the opportunity to edit the css files code. In this way you can modify the design of your web site. You can check our CSS tutorial for more details about the syntax.

In the Predefined Values area you can set predefined lists of values for different variables like country, height, religion, body type and more.

Using the Payment Settings you can configure your application to accept payments through different engines like PayPal, 2CheckOut, Authorize.net and others.

The Blogs Settings area allows you to define different settings regarding the blogs that will be published on the web site. You can limit the length of the blog comments, title and other characteristics. You can define the number of blogs shown per page.

The next area is called News Settings. There you can define similar characteristics for the news that will be published on the web site.

The Groups Settings take care about the way a group is visualized and the members in it are managed. There you will find some predefined templates for the invitation of new members, approver notification, rejection notification and more.

In the Tag Settings area you can enter all the tags for your web site, separated by commas.

In the Polls Settings area you can allow members polls, enable profiles polls activation and limit the number of polls that a user can create.

The Moderation Settings area contains the moderation options for the members accounts.

The Database Pruning area allows you to define the period of time after which the old messages, profiles, greetings, profile reviews and private messages will be deleted.

In the Meta Tags area you can define the meta data for your web site and improve the search engine ranking.

The Permalinks tool allows you to set friendly permalinks for profiles, news, blogs, articles, events, classifieds, groups, gallery photos, videos and music.

 The last option in the admin area is called Logout. By clicking on it you will log out from the admin area.