First of all – if you don't have your own web-server yet and don't know, what following means and don't have anybody (a server-provider) to ask, go for the hosted version of WF-RepTool. With the hosted version your WF-RepTool installation will be located on our server and you don't have to care for anything.

Background

The WF-Reptool is a Web-application implemented in PHP and using MySql or MariaDB as database.

System requirements

  • any web-server supporting PHP - very recommended is Debian Linux with Apache or Nginx, related to expierences with MySql on Windows servers (low performance) we do not recommend Microsoft Internet Information Server
  • PHP Version >= 5.0.5 with iconv- and MySqli-module activated, PHP 7.4 is recommended, PHP 8.x is not yet supported
  • MySql Version >= 5.0 or MariaDB with activated InnoDB-support
  • of course the web-address (Internet-domain or at least an IP-address), under which the WF-Reptool should be accessed by it's users
  • a local MySql/MariaDB user with grants to create databases (alternative you can pre-create a database and give the grants only to this one) - MySql-access from outside is not needed.
  • not necessarily needed, but very useful for installation services and having the option of automatic WF-RepTool program updates is a (S)FTP user having access to the web-directory where the WF-RepTool should be installed.

Further installation guidance will be given in your install package.

Data security

Currently the WF-Reptool has 2 access-modes:

  • "reporter level" for giving access to your treatment partners -> in this view one can only see the data of his company
  • "system level" -> there you can see the data of all treatment partners of the WEEE-system

This mechanism is implemented in PHP-code using session-cookies so everything stands and falls with passwords (if someone gets a system-level-password he can see all the data)

Of course the main part regarding data-security relies on the server-configuration:

  • avoid access to the database from outside
  • avoid the chance of infiltration with executables (PHP-, PEAR-scripts, etc.)

One detail on this -> the PHP-safe mode can't be activated, because the used third-party modules for PDF- and Excel-export don't work with this, but that shouldn't be the problem as the safe-mode is just a little helper for "bad" configured servers (see PHP-manual)

Data Backup

As usually each server has implemented its own backup-tools, the WF-Reptool itself provides nothing for data-backup.

It is strongly recommended that you agree on a clear backup-strategy with your server-provider.