Hello
Sinc the modifications of cloudant plan, I tried to use CouchDB (without SSL for the moment)
I installed and setup a CouchDB server on my Mac using TapForms manual
When I log in Tap Forms to the server :
It’s running OK on the Mac
But I cannot log on my iOS device. I receive a message “Vérifiez l’URL du serveur, le nom d’utilisateur et le mot de passe. Connexion au serveur impossible”
I use the same IP address than the Mac : 127….
I don’t know what is the good IP address to use as “actual IP address” of my own couchDB server
Could you help me please. Thank you very much
Sorry for my bad language skills…
Yes my little cloud couchdb server at 1&1 is running fine and very fast! Every Tap Forms sync is perfect, fast, instantly. Big files, or smaller files into the database, no problems ’til yet. Very faster than the iCloud Sync!
You need: 1&1 Account, one Cloud Server Package (on the german site the prices starts at 4,99 Euro per month. Diskspace is 30GB SSD on my small S package. And for easier ssl handle you need a domain from 1&1 who is switched to the servers ip adress. You get a certificate from 1&1 for one domain for free.
You can change the serversize everytime if you want. One day bigger, two days smaller, never changes, your choice.
My server at the moment is this one:
You can install couchdb with this package with 1-Click install. After this you must do some small things in a ini.file… certificate files copy on the server etc. Thats all.
You have the choice of more then 100 1-Click install apps also. A shopsystem or a CMS.
Then you can administrate your couchdb database via the couchdb Backend on the webbrowser. You must never put a finger on the serverthings on 1&1. Only pay the invoices from 1&1, thats all :-)
You can give user permissions with individual passwords into this backend. So your employees can work on a Tap Forms database, or your wife or all together. If your fired an employee maybe, you can delete this user from couchdb and he cannot login in the Tap Forms Database again.
The own Mac Server at home
I’m was thinking about this also. But you must check always the hardware, always check if the disk ok inside, if the Mac ok and check all security rules to make the server safe against attacks. Then you need a dynamic DNS service. And here in Germany we have slowly internet connection inbound. Outbound is no problem, 100, 400 Mps but inbound very, very slower. This is a problem too here in my area.
At the end is it a calculation: 200 Euro for an older MacMini, Costs of power and maybe the Mac works for two, three years without problems. Then I need the next mac.
Now I paid 60 or maybe 70 Euro for a year for all connected users, all things together and I can make my jobs without headaches.
Hi Bruce,
One of my other customers has had some success with a low cost CouchDB sync service. He wrote about it in this forum post just the other day:
CouchDB is running on my own 1&1 Cloud
He also just told me today that he got it working properly with an SSL certificate and it’s working well for him now. And I think the hosting provider charges about EUR 4.99 per month. I don’t know what the storage size or throughput is provided with that plan though.
You can also use a Mac (or even another type of computer) in your own network to install Apache CouchDB yourself for free. I have another few customers (that I know of) who are also doing that.
Where did you get the SSL certificate from? Is it self assigned? If so, then you’ll need to install it in your Keychain and set the Trust option to “Trust Always”. You’ll need to also email the .crt file to your iOS devices, install the certificate, and then go to Settings > General > About > Certificate Trust Settings. Then tap the switch control next to your certificate to “Enable Full Trust for Root Certificates”. But that’s only required for self-assigned certificates.
Oh what a work…
The first time in my life who I’m configure a server and all this stuff.
I have now an own small cloud server. On this is installed couchDB via bitnami 1-click install. The costs for the server are about 4,99 per month in Euro.
You get a 30GB SSD Disk and the speed is ok I think for simply database syncs.
I need many hours before the couchdb server was running. But I make all notices from my way and every step to a running system. Maybe this can help other people. You need FileZilla and a good terminal soft. I use Zoc7 for this on the Mac. Very fine terminal.
Everything is fine now, the sync with tapforms is very, very fast on 1&1 with couchdb. Very faster than iCloud!
But 1 Problem I have: How is the way to make this all safer with ssl secure? Nobody can tell me the right way. I have changed everything in the “local.ini” on the server. But TapForms say to me: No right certificate and don’t sync via ssl.
Here some screens from the 1&1 Server Dashboard:
You can grab your own cloud server at 1&1 here:
1&1 Canada
1&1 Germany
1&1 USA
Hi
thanks to recent advice I’ve managed to get a copy of a document transferred between MacBook Air & iPhone, I thought all was back to normal, but now I’m getting garbage populating in the Cloudant username field on the iPhone TF?! (It appears correctly set & logged in on the desktop version)
Whenever I attempt to enter the correct details the username field jumps to being full of repeated https:// text.
I believe I have requested the document to be deleted from iCloud… (I didn’t even know I’d requested it to go there – Is that a default action?) Anyways, does that now mean I’ve turned iCloud sync off?? – I see some references to that being required to use Cloudant sync. Again this is something that has always worked flawlessly for me previously, but it seems this year everything is going weird with my Tap Forms efforts!
Any advice to get my Cloudant sync settings entered correctly?
Many thanks, regards, Stephen.
Hello Jun-ichi,
Using iTunes File sSharing will the quickest way to get your file across.
But the error is some sort of SSL connection error. I would try rebooting. If that doesn’t work, try uninstalling and re-installing Tap Forms and see if that solves the problem. Backup your data first.
Is the error on macOS or iOS?
Dear Brendan,
I tried to follow your instructions to install couchdb on my mac server.
But, when I try to set up SSL connection, everything is smooth, until when I tried to add the options “Daemons” “httpsd” “{chttpd, start_link, [https]}”, the Web interface cannot add this options with a warning “Option add failed: Config section backlisted for modification over HTTP API.:
Can you help me?
Thanx
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Thanks, Brendan for this thorough and almost immediate response. You tech support is phenomenal. This is very helpful and the feature will work perfectly for my needs.
One problem, though. I just returned from out of town where I experienced difficulty using my LTE data. Long story short, I had to upgrade from iOS 10.x to iOS 11.1.2. This resulted in a change in the name of my iPhone. Naturally, the OS Tapforms app did not recognize the iPhone until I changed the name back to the original name. However, now when I try to sync, I get the following message: “Error syncing with johndoes-se.local., reason: An SSL error has occurred and a secure connection to the server cannot be made.”
Also, when I try to add the send the new (encrypted) document to the iPhone (“Select a nearby device to send the selected database document to:”), the iPhone fails to appear in the window. Both the OS and iOS device are on the same network.
Any idea how to help me re-establish the nearby sync and add the new encrypted database document?
Thanks again!
With the new TAPForm 5.2.3 computer and IOS 5.2.2 (777) updates, I no longer get SSL messages AND changes made on IPhone now change DB on computer! Way to go Brendan!
And even though the update says it fixes stuff in High Sierra, it also fixed the problem in low Sierra 10.12.6
Hi Brendan,
OS 11.1.1 on IPone 62.
In TapForms Settings on IPhone I am trying to set up Security Settings. I entered a Password, Saved, then went on to encypt DB and get an error “Failed to Encrpt- Unable to encrypt this document. Please close and reopen this document and try again” I do that and I get the same error.
Even after setting up a password, I can still open DB without Password.
Also can’t enable Touch ID. Seems to crash app sometimes.
On the syncing issue, the DB on my desktop machine syncs TO the iPhone just fine, but still can’t make change to record on iPhone and have that auto sync to desktop DB. Half way is better than no way I suppose.
Keep getting this message on the Desktop machine: “Error syncing with jonos-iphone-2017.local., reason: An SSL error has occurred and a secure connection to the server cannot be made.”
Fix still in the works for all this?
Thanks.
Jonathan
Hi Leslie,
Ya, it’s probably because the hotel network doesn’t allow you to connect to a random set of port numbers. When Tap Forms starts a listener on a device to facilitate Nearby sync, it generates a random port number. Network administrators have the ability to allow only specific port numbers to be connected to on their network. For example, when you connect to a secure website over SSL, port 403 is used. For non-secure website connections, port 80 is used. So each service has their own unique port number they communicate on. Tap Form’s port numbers are generally high up in the 10,000 range and above, but randomly generated.
So that’s why it wouldn’t work on a hotel network, because they block access to most port numbers and allow traffic only on a very limited set of port numbers.
As for why the photo didn’t sync before, that’s a good question. Perhaps there’s a bug in Tap Forms somewhere that sometimes misses syncing an object.
You could try removing the devices from the Nearby sync devices list and then re-adding them. When you do that, Tap Forms will reset the sync counters it manages so that next time a full database sync will happen instead of an incremental sync.
Hi Brendan.
1) is the update going to be the desktop, mobile or both versions?
2) i finally figured out that list view thing. I needed to re-order the fields on the mobile version of my DB, but I’d like that re-order to not sync over to the desktop DB. Are the two idependent of each other? In other words are the only changes being synced are the changes in a field?
3) love that you can place call within contact!
4) is the ssl issue why I can’t sync FROM Iphone, but am able to make changes from desktop TO Iphone and that works?
5) in the Tools > Web/ftp settings, does any of that need to be filled in to use nearby sync? Right now I’ve filled in username and password for my wifi, but the save and or Done button don’t seem to do anything.
6) In the Tools> Files setting on Iphone at the bottom of the window there is control button thatat toggles Web Server Off. If activated, I see my phone name and some other cryptic stuff. Should this always be on or off or doesn’t it matter?
Sorry for all the ???? Trying to get the hang of it.
Jonathan
I have an update coming out that fixes the SSL error.
If you set the “List View Fields” setting on the form to something higher than 1, then Tap Forms will display more fields. Up to the first 5 fields can be displayed on the single column list view.
Thanks!
Brendan
After a little fiddling I am now working. Thanks. I didn’t even know there were videos so thanks for the pointer. I had stumbled on the forms layout and switched to column view but didn’t notice the column width control. Adjustable width makes a good feature even better. Thanks for that feature.
The first thing I did when my document appeared on the mac is delete all my bogus searches. If deleting searches is supported on ios I never found it. Instead I renamed the bogus ones so they showed up at the end of the list. It was nice to finally make them go away.
Note: The apple magic terminology for sending wirelessly between devices is “share with airdrop.” You will notice that those are the words that appear above the device icon in the share menu that you wanted me to use. The Send Documents menu has a plethora of choices for sending documents including via Dropbox and email. Airdrop is just one of many. If you don’t explicitly say airdrop many users will not know which you mean and most will assume that all the share options will work because that is the behavior for most apps. I just started going through the methods I know starting with Dropbox. Unfortunately I stopped before I got to airdrop.
Note2: I know Apple has a history of changing these things around but the activity icon is most frequently called the share icon, especially by Apple. Both are officially correct. Activity was the original name (actually upload was the original original name) and Apple lists both names but ‘share’ is more common and I expect ‘activity’ will eventually disappear as a name for the icon. I think you would be less likely to confuse your users if you called it the share icon as well. Hopefully Apple will stop renaming it.
Anyway thanks for the help. Learning the Mac app should be easier because there is a manual. That will probably help me with the iPhone app as well. As for sync I will try switching to IBM next and when that works switch to my own cloudDB server. One step at a time. I have been using MongoDB for other personal apps but may switch them to cloudDB as well so I only need to support one nosql database.
