EMR Property Management Version 2.0November 2013
Thank you for purchasing EMR-PM Property Management.
If you have any questions that are beyond the scope of this help file, please do not hesitate to email me via our Site.
I am always happy to help if you have any questions relating to EMR-PM.
For the latest version of this document, please visit the Online Version.
Easy to get started, everything you need to grow your Rental Property Business. EMR-PM is simple and fun to use - just log in, and start adding in your Properties and Tenants.
A. Pre-Installation top
1. Unzip EMR-PM and have a look around.
Unzip the EMR-PM file and take a look at the file structure. You should see 13 folders and 3 files.
2. Create a Database.
First step is to create a MySQL database, and if you do not have a default one, a database user. This process is explained in great detail on many websites and web hosts. Once you have the database setup, you will need:
- The hostname almost always "localhost"
- The database name ie. EMR-PM
- The database username ie: database_user
- The database password ie: database_password.
3. Upload EMR-PM
Upload all the files you unzipped to your webhost, keeping the file system intact.
You should now have the following folders/files on your host account:
B. Installation top
Run the Online Setup Wizard
Installation is quite easy and only takes a few minutes.
Once EMR-PM has finished uploading, simply go to http://www.yoursite.com/EMR-PM/ (or wherever subfolder you uploaded it to) and follow the on-screen instructions.
Easy to do, just follow the defaults and plug in your specific information.
1. Database Configuration
- Hostname On most web hosts this usually defaults to "localhost"
- Database Username Your username to access the database
- Database Password Your database password
- Database Name The name of the database you plan to install EMR-PM to
Once you have input your database information, click on the "On to Step 2" button.
If you run into any errors here, simply delete the config.php file from the folder you uploaded EMR-PM to, and try again.
If everything was configured correctly, you will see the following:
2. EMR-PM Settings
Again, follow the defaults and plug in your site's specific information. You can set your Administrator password and Site name to be anything you would like. Once completed, be sure to hit "On to Step 3" to save your settings.
*If the Installation URL is not auto-filled, you will need to enter it manually.
This is needed for email notifications to both Tenants & Admins. Include any sub-folder EMR-PM may be installed in. (ie. http://www.mydomain.com/EMR-PM/)
Look at your browser's URL bar, and use that (remove the install/install.php from the end) as your Installation URL.
If you have any questions on this, please do not hesitate to email me via our Corporate Site.
3. The Primary Admin Account
Complete the Primary Admin Account form. This is the main, "Superuser" for EMR-PM. This Admin Account cannot be deleted through the web UI, only from within the database (ie. PHPMyAdmin).
Once you have filled in the information for the Primary Admin, click the "Complete Install" button to complete the installation.
Once installation is completed, you will need to go back into your FTP application, and either rename or Delete the installation folder before you can log in as Administrator.
C. Settings - Explained top
1. Settings
Once EMR-PM is installed, you can update the Site Settings after logging in as the Primary Admin. Go to Site Settings page from the Dashboard dropdown menu.
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Global Site Settings
- Installation URL Used in all File Uploads & email notifications. Must include the trailing slash (ie. http://mysite.com/EMR-PM/).
- Localization Choose the Language file to use throughout EMR-PM. All Localization files need to be translated from English.
- Site Name ie. EMR-PM (Appears at the top of the browser, the header logo, in the footer and in other headings throughout the site).
- Business Name
- Business Address Address & Phone. (Appears in Tenant's Receipt).
- Business Email Used in email notifications as the "from/reply to" email address.
- Business Phone
- Contact Phone Phone Number Tenants can call for General Information, Questions etc.
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File/Image Upload Settings
- Property Files Upload Directory Where Property Files upload to (Admin Side ONLY). Must include the trailing slash (ie. uploads/).
- Templates Upload Directory Where EMR-PM Forms & Templates upload to (Admin Side ONLY). Must include the trailing slash (ie. templates/).
- Tenant Documents Upload Directory Where Tenant documents upload to (Admin Side ONLY). Must include the trailing slash (ie. docs/).
- Upload File Types Allowed The file types you allow to be uploaded, NO spaces & each separated by a comma (Format: xls,pdf,doc,docx).
- Avatar Upload Directory Where both Admin & Tenant Avatars upload to. Must include the trailing slash (ie. avatars/).
- Avatar File Types Allowed The file types you allow to be uploaded, NO spaces & each separated by a comma (Format: jpg,jpeg,png).
- Property Pictures Upload Directory Where Property Pictures upload to (Admin Side ONLY). Must include the trailing slash (ie. pictures/).
- Property Pictures File Types Allowed The file types you allow to be uploaded, NO spaces & each separated by a comma (Format: jpg,jpeg,png).
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Rental Payment Settings
- Enable rental payments through PayPal? Set to Yes to allow Tenants to make rental payments via PayPal.
- PayPal Payment Currency Code
- Payment Completed Message What the Tenant will see once they have completed a PayPal rental payment.
- PayPal Account Email Your PayPal Account's email — where PayPal payments will be sent to.
- PayPal Item Name The item name that appears on the PayPal payment screen.
- PayPal Use Fee Fee charged by PayPal. Do not include '%' symbol (ie. 0.5).
2. Primary Admin
The Primary Admin Account is a "Superuser", and has access to all settings, other Admins, Tenants, Properties and Leases.
You can update the Primary Admin's Account from the Admin Accounts dropdown menu.
D. Advanced - Custom Styling top
1. Custom Styling
While EMR-PM already has a modern flat interface based on Twitter's Bootstrap, many of you will want to integrate it into your own design. This is very easy, however, you will need to be able to write HTML/CSS code. For those that aren't versed, here is a quick overview. The easiest way to change the look is by editing the default CSS files named "emr.css" and "custom.css". Next is to edit the page files, located in the "pages" folders in both the main folder and the admin/ folder.
2. Images
EMR-PM only has two images, bg.png (the page background for all pages) & logo.png.
All icons are generated from an Icon Font: Font Awesome (version 4.0.3). Check out all of Font Awesome's icons & usage at:
http://fontawesome.io.
Icons & Images can be changed to your liking. You may want to change the EMR-PM logo to that of your company logo.
The EMR-PM logo is 245px x 50px.
E. General EMR-PM Usage top
Great! Got all of that?
Yup? Show me some Day to Day EMR-PM Usage
F. Help & Support top
Please, if you have any questions, run into any issues or just need some help, do not hesitate to contact me.
I believe in providing the best support possible, and I monitor my email just about 24/7 (ok, not when I am sleeping).
I love to hear feedback, and welcome any suggestions you may have to make EMR-PM better.
G. A Note About FTP top
If you are having problems with EMR-PM after successfully installing and logging in the for the first time you should check your FTP software settings. I have found in many cases that numerous FTP programs are not uploading files correctly.
Check your FTP program to see if it is uploading files in ASCII - which is causing the file code to be uploaded in one long line.
Try changing it to Binary and uploading the files again. Upload everything except the install folder and the config file (or better yet, if you have not started using EMR-PM,
just wipe the install and the database and reinstall a fresh copy).
I use CuteFTP for my uploads and ran into this problem a few months ago when all of the sudden everything I was working on just seemed to stop working as expected.