Software:DaDaBIK

DaDaBIK

Developer(s)	Eugenio Tacchini
Initial release	November 21, 2001 (2001-11-21)
Stable release	11.0 Elba / June 17, 2021 (2021-06-17)
Written in	PHP
Operating system	Cross-platform
Available in	Front-end multilingual (22)
Type	Database Web Application Builder, no-code Web development platform
License	before 4.5 GPL, after 4.5 proprietary
Website	dadabik.com

DaDaBIK is a no-code / low-code development platform written in PHP for quickly creating a CRUD (create, read, update, delete) database front-end or a more sophisticated database-driven Web application without coding. The database management systems currently supported are MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite and, starting from version 9.2, Microsoft SQL Server.

History

DaDaBIK was originally released in 2001 on SourceForge under the GNU General Public License by Eugenio Tacchini and supported only MySQL.

With the version 4.5 release in June 2012, the license changed from GPL to a proprietary "DaDaBIK 1.0" license which requires payment before downloading, and prohibits further redistribution. The (old) GPL code (DaDaBIK v. 4.x) has been removed from the official website and from the Sourceforge project but can still be distributed freely, the current version (at the moment, 11.0 "Elba") can be downloaded only from the official Website.

Version 6 has introduced some new features including the possibility to add custom (hand-coded) PHP pages to a DaDaBIK application.

Version 8 Lerici had a new, responsive, front-end has been introduced, together with many new features, including graph reports generation, calculated fields, hooks and smart installation (DaDaBIK tries to automatically configure an application according to its database schema). A new license, DaDaBIK license v. 2.0, has also been introduced.

Version 9 "Monterosso" has been another important milestone in the development of DaDaBIK. DaDaBIK 9 allows to build a Web application without coding starting from an Excel, CSV or ODS file (before V.9, you could build a DaDaBIK application only starting from a database). Several new features which help power users to develop complex applications have also been introduced, including: custom buttons, dashboards and layout hooks. A new license, DaDaBIK license v. 2.1, has also been introduced

Version 9.2 introduced the support for Microsoft SQL Server.

Version 10 "Manarola", released on December 2019, celebrates 18 years of DaDaBIK and introduced a new way of developing DaDaBIK applications thanks to the new data section (developers can now create tables from within DaDaBIK, without using external applications) and to the new form configurator live preview (developers can see a live preview of the form they are configuring, without leaving the admin section). . Many new features have also been introduced, including: HTTP API, Audit/revision, Conditional Fields, Pivot/Summary tables, multiple records selection. The performances of the DaDaBIK engine has also been improved.

Version 11 "Elba", released on June 2021 introduced some new features, including: "live edit"; Import and synchronization with MS Excel, CSV and ODS files; Ajax uploads.

Current status

The current release is the 11.0 "Elba" (released on June 17, 2021). The original author is still the main developer behind the core of the code while Simone Magnaschi takes care of the UX e UI design and some of the Javascript front-end programming. A group of mother tongue users handle the translation/localization of the front-end (available in 22 languages).

Features

Some of the main features are: forms customization (e.g. labels, different types of HTML input field, content check), lookup fields, master/details view, files upload, calculated fields, conditional fields, hooks, graph/pivot report generation, export to CSV and PDF, checking for possible duplication during insertions, authentication, authorization restrictions on view/update/delete, and e-mail notices.

Popularity and notability

DaDaBIK has been used by developers, companies, non-profits and Universities worldwide. Since its first releases, it has been particularly popular in the academic world and has been adopted by several big organizations like the University of Cambridge, the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore. and the Yale University.

Most of the applications created with DaDaBIK are for internal use (some examples: general data-entry applications, admin tools, tools for Business process management automation, Web databases, CRMs, libraries management, museums catalogue management) and are not publicly accessible on Internet.

Considering that it was originally released in 2001, it can be considered one of the very first Web No-code development platform

DaDaBIK is listed in many software repositories, including Capterra and Hotscripts.

Meaning of the name

DaDaBIK is a recursive acronym which stands for: "DaDaBIK is a DataBase Interfaces Kreator".