PREFERendum

A flexible, self-hosted webapp for scheduling and polls

• Based on sprudel and ported to CakePHP
• Clean, intuitive interface
• yes/no/maybe options
• Answer trend visualization
• Free entry of arbitrary answer options or dates (using the built-in date picker)
• Unique public links for sharing a poll
• One-click clipboard copy of the poll URL
• Comments section in every poll
• Mini View feature (for very big poll tables)
• Customizable labels: All the labels and texts can be set to custom strings, so you can even translate the interface to a language of your choice
• Customizable colors:
  • All the interface colors can easily be set to your preference (system-wide, that is, not for individual polls)
  • Toggle between light and dark color themes
• Optional:
  • Poll admin links to restrict poll management to author
  • Receive email after new entry and/or comment
  • Collect user contact information with a poll entry
  • Poll administration interface for managing all the polls on the server
  • Simple user administration for admin interface
  • Restrict poll creation to backend users only
  • Allow users to change their entry through a personal links
  • Make votes only visible for admin
  • Create anonymous votes (no user name stored/shown)
  • Lock poll automatically at a certain date
  • Define maximum number of entries per option
  • Protect poll by a password

Requirements

• PHP 8.1 or higher (including intl and mbstring extension)
• One of the following databases:
  • MySql (5.7 or higher)
  • MariaDB (10.1 or higher)
  • PostgreSQL (9.6 or higher)

Installation

• Create an empty MariaDB/MySql/PostgreSQL database on your server, note down the DB host address, user name and password
• Install option #1:
  • Download the latest PREFERendum release archive preferendum_vX.X.X.zip from releases
  • Extract the contents of the archive into a new directory (e.g. preferendum on your computer)
  • Take care of proper folder permissions, see CakePHP permissions
  • Copy config/app_local.example.php and rename it to config/app_local.php.
• Install option #2:
  • Download source code from latest release
  • Download Composer
  • Run composer install --no-dev. The install command will download all needed dependencies.
• In config/app_local.php change the following entries:
  • Datasources\Default: Set host, driver ('Mysql' for MySql/MariaDB or 'Postgres' for PostgreSQL) username, password, database according to your environment.
  • Security\Salt: Replace __SALT__ with an arbitrary string (will be done automatically, if composer install method is used).
• In config/preferendum_features.php configure the features as needed.
• Upload the preferendum directory to your web server (root-directory or somewhere else)
• Access <your installation folder>/Db/install through your browser (e.g. yourdomain.com/preferendum/Db/install)
• Delete src/Controller/DbController.php from your server
• Enjoy!

Update

Starting with v0.7.0 database update scripts had been added to PREFERendum, so that one can keep the existing database & data. But this feature can be only used, if the old database is on v0.6.0 (or newer)!

Access <your installation folder>/Db/update through your browser (e.g. yourdomain.com/preferendum/Db/update) and select from which to which version your PREFERendum database shall be updated.

Configuration and customization

You can turn on/off and configure all the available features in config/preferendum_features.php. For a full list of the options see the Wiki.

Poll administration interface (off by default)

If you want to use the optional admin interface (to view and delete any polls on your server via a web interface at yourdomain.com/preferendum/admin) you have to enable this in config/preferendum_features.php ('adminInterface')! See Admin Interface for more information.

Contribution

This is my first project using CakePHP, so there might exist many code sections, which could be implemented much more elegant with the build-in CakePHP features. I'm open for any optimization, just send a (well documented) pull request! Same for suggestions for additional features or if you are running into problems setting up PREFERendum, please write an issue.

If you want to work on the code, clone the repositiory and run composer install. This will download CakePHP library and dependencies.

If you just like PREFERendum as it is, let me know by donating this repo a star.

Help translating

New translations and corrections are highly welcome! You can either fork the source code from GitHub, make your changes and create a pull request or you can participate on Transifex: https://www.transifex.com/elth0r0/preferendum/

Attribution of used third-party software/media

PREFERendum makes use of the following software/media and says Thank you! to:

• /bkis/sprudel
• CakePHP
• /fengyuanchen/datepicker
• /jquery/jquery
• /zenorocha/clipboard.js
• Icons from iconmonstr.com
• JS light/dark theme toggle