A Small History
CKEditor has been one of the most popular and used WYSIWYG editor for web, which has been used by many popular open source projects, websites and companies. According to its official website, FCKeditor has been around for more than six years. Since 2003 it has built a strong user community becoming the most used editor in the market, accumulating more than 3,5 million downloads. On 2009, the company decided renaming the editor, bringing to the light their next generation solution: CKEditor 3.0.
CKEditor inherits the quality and strong features people were used to find in FCKeditor, in a much more modern product, added by dozens of new benefits, like accessibility and ultimate performance.CKEditor has made many features pluggable so that it can be extended by developers according to their needs.
Why this tutorial?
However, the new CKEditor does not provide the File Manager/File Browser that it used to provide by default in FCKEditor. This functionality is now provided by CKFinder. CKFinder provides many cool functions and is definitely a better product than traditional FCKEditor’s FIle Browser, but its not a free product and users have to purchase the license in order to use the product.
If you are not willing to purchase CKFinder you can make your own external file manager and plugin to CKEditor through its APIs, alternatively you can directly integrate the FCKEditor’s File Manager (File Browser) feature with CKEditor. This is what i am going to describe in this short tutorial.
Before starting the tutorial you may also like to view the fully functional demo, or you may download the example and start working on it. Please note that this tutorial is for the PHP language and connectors, but same steps can also be applied for other supported languages and connectors.
Also I assume that you have sufficient knowledge about integrating CKEditor on your page.
Starting with the tutorial
Download the CKEditor and copy it to your desired folder. In this example I have copied it to
siteroot/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor
demo.html is the page where I would like to add the WYSIWYG editor, and I have placed my page over here:
siteroot/filemanager_in_ckeditor/demo.html
Since we are going to integrate the inbuilt File Manager available in FCKEditor we will copy the ‘filemanager’ folder from the FCKEditor source files which is genereally located in
fckeditor/editor/
In this example I have copied the ‘filemanager’ folder to
siteroot/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/
At this stage you may delete the connectors from the filemanager folder which you are not using. I have deleted all the connector folders except the ‘php’ connector which I am using in this example.
Once the required files are copied you need to tie up the filemanager with CKEditor and make it active in the code. To do this you need to modify the CKEditor intialization code like below. (Obviously this goes in demo.html page in my case)
CKEDITOR.replace( 'editor1', { filebrowserBrowseUrl :'js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php', filebrowserImageBrowseUrl : 'js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Image&Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php', filebrowserFlashBrowseUrl :'js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Flash&Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php'} );
The above options, enables the “Browse Server” buttons on the “Link”, “Image”, “Flash” dialogs. You will have to adjust the above paths according to your directory structure. Also please note that for the sake of simplicity I have hard coded my website domain (www.mixedwaves.com) in the above paths, this should be changed to whatever is applicable in your case and can be added dynamically instead of hard coding it.
One important thing to remember at this stage is that while integrating the File Browser in CKEditor we still have to make configuration changes that we used to do for enabling the Browse and Upload functions in FCKEditor. Like enabling the php connector and specifying the UserFilesPath to correct location in:
filemanager/connectors/php/config.php
Up to now if everything has gone correct, you should be able to see the “Browse Server” buttons in the “Link”, “Image” and “Flash” dialogs. Clicking on the “Browse Server” button would open the “File Manager” window.
As a last step to making everything work you need to modify the following file:
filemanager/browser/default/frmresourcelist.html
You need to add the following JavaScript function, where all the other Javascript functions have been defined. Copy and paste the below code:
function GetUrlParam( paramName ) { var oRegex = new RegExp( '[\?&]' + paramName + '=([^&]+)', 'i' ) ; var oMatch = oRegex.exec( window.top.location.search ) ; if ( oMatch && oMatch.length > 1 ) return decodeURIComponent( oMatch[1] ) ; else return '' ; }
In the same file you need to modify the function called “OpenFile”. Search the function “OpenFile” and replace it with the following function:
Update: 25 June 2011
File names with spaces are now visible in preview window. Earlier filenames with spaces were not encoded correctly hence were not visible in preview window. Thanks to Angela Yamat and Len
function OpenFile( fileUrl ) { //PATCH: Using CKEditors API we set the file in preview window. funcNum = GetUrlParam('CKEditorFuncNum') ; //fixed the issue: images are not displayed in preview window when filename contain spaces due encodeURI encoding already encoded fileUrl window.top.opener.CKEDITOR.tools.callFunction( funcNum, fileUrl); /////////////////////////////////// window.top.close() ; window.top.opener.focus() ; }
The above code essentially sets the file URL to the preview window in the dialog box, when user selects a file in the File Manager.
With this you are done integrating the File Manager in CKEditor.
If everything has been configured and patched correctly, you should now be able to use a fully functional File Browser window just like you used to do in old FCKEditor.
Update: 3rd April 2010
With the generous effort of Brombomb, you can now also enable the ‘Upload’ tab for quick upload of files in your File Browser. You can find the hack on this link: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1903510/ckeditor-integration-with-fckeditor-filebrowser/2564039
I have also implemented the above solution but with few modifications and in more systematic way so that the functionality is as close as possible with the old FCKEditor file browser. Thanks again to Brombomb.
Continuing with the tutorial, Enabling Quick Upload
Once you are done with the above steps you will have fairly working File Browser Window. However the old FCKEditor also supported a feature called Quick Upload and had separate upload tab. The upload tab can be enabled and made functional by following the below four steps.
In your CKEditor initialization code you need to add few more config variables as shown below that enables the Quick Upload tab. (Again this goes in demo.html page)
CKEDITOR.replace( 'editor1', { filebrowserBrowseUrl :'js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php', filebrowserImageBrowseUrl : 'js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Image&Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php', filebrowserFlashBrowseUrl :'js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Flash&Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php', filebrowserUploadUrl :'http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/upload.php?Type=File', filebrowserImageUploadUrl : 'http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/upload.php?Type=Image', filebrowserFlashUploadUrl : 'http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/upload.php?Type=Flash' });
Again need not mention, that the domain needs to be replaced by your own domain. The last three config variables in the above code enables the “Upload” tab in your “Flash”, “Image”, “File” dialogs. Same can be done for “Media” type which I haven’t done in this tutorial.
Now in next few steps we are going to modify/hack few files, this needs little care and attention.
Open the the file
filemanager/connectors/php/upload.php
And search and replace the PHP function call “FileUpload” with the following code snippet
// Get the CKEditor Callback $CKEcallback = $_GET['CKEditorFuncNum']; //pass it on to file upload function FileUpload( $sType, $sCurrentFolder, $sCommand, $CKEcallback );
Now open the below file and search for the function definition “FileUpload”.
filemanager/connectors/php/commands.php
Here we are going to add a new parameter to the function parameter list, as well as some modification in the body of the function. I would recommend you to replace the entire function definition with the following new function definition
// Notice the last paramter added to pass the CKEditor callback function function FileUpload( $resourceType, $currentFolder, $sCommand, $CKEcallback = '' ) { if (!isset($_FILES)) { global $_FILES; } $sErrorNumber = '0' ; $sFileName = '' ; //PATCH to detect a quick file upload. if (( isset( $_FILES['NewFile'] ) && !is_null( $_FILES['NewFile']['tmp_name'] ) ) || (isset( $_FILES['upload'] ) && !is_null( $_FILES['upload']['tmp_name'] ) )) { global $Config ; //PATCH to detect a quick file upload. $oFile = isset($_FILES['NewFile']) ? $_FILES['NewFile'] : $_FILES['upload']; // Map the virtual path to the local server path. $sServerDir = ServerMapFolder( $resourceType, $currentFolder, $sCommand ) ; // Get the uploaded file name. $sFileName = $oFile['name'] ; $sFileName = SanitizeFileName( $sFileName ) ; $sOriginalFileName = $sFileName ; // Get the extension. $sExtension = substr( $sFileName, ( strrpos($sFileName, '.') + 1 ) ) ; $sExtension = strtolower( $sExtension ) ; if ( isset( $Config['SecureImageUploads'] ) ) { if ( ( $isImageValid = IsImageValid( $oFile['tmp_name'], $sExtension ) ) === false ) { $sErrorNumber = '202' ; } } if ( isset( $Config['HtmlExtensions'] ) ) { if ( !IsHtmlExtension( $sExtension, $Config['HtmlExtensions'] ) && ( $detectHtml = DetectHtml( $oFile['tmp_name'] ) ) === true ) { $sErrorNumber = '202' ; } } // Check if it is an allowed extension. if ( !$sErrorNumber && IsAllowedExt( $sExtension, $resourceType ) ) { $iCounter = 0 ; while ( true ) { $sFilePath = $sServerDir . $sFileName ; if ( is_file( $sFilePath ) ) { $iCounter++ ; $sFileName = RemoveExtension( $sOriginalFileName ) . '(' . $iCounter . ').' . $sExtension ; $sErrorNumber = '201' ; } else { move_uploaded_file( $oFile['tmp_name'], $sFilePath ) ; if ( is_file( $sFilePath ) ) { if ( isset( $Config['ChmodOnUpload'] ) && !$Config['ChmodOnUpload'] ) { break ; } $permissions = 0777; if ( isset( $Config['ChmodOnUpload'] ) && $Config['ChmodOnUpload'] ) { $permissions = $Config['ChmodOnUpload'] ; } $oldumask = umask(0) ; chmod( $sFilePath, $permissions ) ; umask( $oldumask ) ; } break ; } } if ( file_exists( $sFilePath ) ) { //previous checks failed, try once again if ( isset( $isImageValid ) && $isImageValid === -1 && IsImageValid( $sFilePath, $sExtension ) === false ) { @unlink( $sFilePath ) ; $sErrorNumber = '202' ; } else if ( isset( $detectHtml ) && $detectHtml === -1 && DetectHtml( $sFilePath ) === true ) { @unlink( $sFilePath ) ; $sErrorNumber = '202' ; } } } else $sErrorNumber = '202' ; } else $sErrorNumber = '202' ; $sFileUrl = CombinePaths( GetResourceTypePath( $resourceType, $sCommand ) , $currentFolder ) ; $sFileUrl = CombinePaths( $sFileUrl, $sFileName ) ; if($CKEcallback == '') { SendUploadResults( $sErrorNumber, $sFileUrl, $sFileName ) ; } else { //issue the CKEditor Callback SendCKEditorResults ($sErrorNumber, $CKEcallback, $sFileUrl, $sFileName); } exit ; }
As a final step, we are going to modify the below file and add a new function towards the end of the file
filemanager/connectors/php/io.php
Add the below function towards the end of the file
// This is the function that sends the results of the uploading process to CKEditor. function SendCKEditorResults ($errorNumber, $CKECallback, $fileUrl, $fileName, $customMsg ='') { // Minified version of the document.domain automatic fix script (#1919). // The original script can be found at _dev/domain_fix_template.js echo <<<EOF <script type="text/javascript"> (function(){var d=document.domain;while (true){try{var A=window.parent.document.domain;break;}catch(e) {};d=d.replace(/.*?(?:\.|$)/,'');if (d.length==0) break;try{document.domain=d;}catch (e){break;}}})(); EOF; if ($errorNumber && $errorNumber != 201) { $fileUrl = ""; $fileName= ""; } $msg = ""; switch ($errorNumber ) { case 0 : $msg = "Upload successful"; break; case 1 : // Custom error. $msg = $customMsg; break ; case 201 : $msg = 'A file with the same name is already available. The uploaded file has been renamed to "' . $fileName . '"' ; break ; case 202 : $msg = 'Invalid file' ; break ; default : $msg = 'Error on file upload. Error number: ' + $errorNumber ; break ; } $rpl = array( '\\' => '\\\\', '"' => '\\"' ) ; echo 'window.parent.CKEDITOR.tools.callFunction("'. $CKECallback. '","'. strtr($fileUrl, $rpl). '", "'. strtr( $msg, $rpl). '");' ; echo '</script>'; }
The above function essentially sends back the result of the upload to the preview window. It will alert if something wrong has happened like uploaded an invalid file.
With this we are done with integrating a full featured File Browser in CKEditor.
I hope this tutorial is useful to you. Please post your doubts or questions you may have and I would be happy to respond to it.
PS. I have taken utmost care to place the above code snippets correctly, however my WYSIWYG editor seems to change the PHP and JS code undesirably. If you find any errors/typos in the above code snippets you can check the actual source code files; it would be really great if you can bring it to my notice so that I can correct it and also help you out if possible.
Sorry – that didn’t come out right: try again!
// This is the function that sends the results of the uploading process to CKEditor. function SendCKEditorResults ($errorNumber, $CKECallback, $fileUrl, $fileName, $customMsg ='') { // Minified version of the document.domain automatic fix script (#1919). // The original script can be found at _dev/domain_fix_template.js echo <<'; }I changed it to:
Hi,
Tried to get this to work and failed:
Can you give me the specific directory, I think I changed it in the wrong file.
Thanks, Rick
Inside your connectors/php/config.php you can see the variable set as:
// Path to user files relative to the document root.
$Config['UserFilesPath'] = ‘/userfiles/’ ;
You can set to something else like
// Path to user files relative to the document root.
$Config['UserFilesPath'] = ‘/userfiles/XXXX/’ ;
HI Rick the exact location is ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/config.php
Hi Mark,
Thanks for bringing it to notice. Actually the code blocks are often removed or misinterpreted by the WYSIWYG editor of WordPress so the code in the last function you edited was removed somehow, I have corrected the function again and it should be fine now. Or on the safer side try downloading the Zip file (download link in article) which contains all required code.
Hi Penuel,
HI Rick the exact location is ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/config.php
Sorry to keep asking you this, but I don’t have this directory in ckeditor ??
Any ideas??
Rick
This helped me out …
now modifying it for Classic ASP
Great Joop!. Please do post a link once you have it ready so others could be benefited.
Hi,
I’ve a little problem making it work properly, I’ve spent the day trying different solution to make it work but it didn’t. Everything is working properly, but when I browse and click on the image that I want, It doesn’t get the link. Same thing when I upload a picture, it doesn’t get the link. The upload work well, the browsing work well, I’m just not able to insert any image in the page.
Many thanks for the tutorial. I have tried to do an ASP.NET integration just for browsing and selecting images for the Image button. I decided to use the CKEditor config.js file to set filebrowserImageBrowseUrl as I wanted to have a purely declarative solution without the need for any Javascript coding. Had a problem for a while with the url getting scrambled (I see in the browser.html code that there is a Gecko issue when using relative URLs which do not start with a slash – well this seems to be an issue for IE9 as well). I also had an issue with config.ascx (the ASP.NET of config.php) which required me to add the FCKeditor .dll into the bin directory (which you did not mention for php). And then getting the UserFilePath correct was a pain. But I eventually got the popup to list the image files in my directory. However, without your modification to frmresourceslist.html, clicking on any image file name causes an error in the OpenFile function as it seems that CKEditor does not have a SetUrl method, as discussed at http://cksource.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=15618. However, if I try to make any modification to frmresourceslist.html (even just inserting the GetUrlParam function and not changing OpenFile!), no files are listed in the popup! I have tried this several times and cleared the browser cache etc and cannot understand it. Any ideas?
And, by the way, is there any easy way of turning off the upload feature without modifying the code?
Jon
Of course as soon as I submitted my previous post I realised my rather silly error – I had copied your code from this page which includes a > in the GetUrlParam function. Yet another example of why I hate Javascript – no meaningful diagnostics and random results which do not appear to relate in any way to the cause of the problem!
But I still have the question about turning off the upload and create folder functions. Not setting filebrowserImageUploadUrl means that there is no Upload tab in the Image dialog, which is fine, but there are still upload and create folder features in the file browser window. Is there a property which can kill these or do I have to rip the code apart?
Will do so IF I can get it to work
Struggling with the FileManagers internals … can’t see the files in the browser.
Hi,
Thank you for your amazing work, so much easier with your documentation than the original one from the website.
I’ve work a whole day on a issue that I’m not able to find the solution, Everything works really well, I’m able to upload, I’m able to browse and see the files, but when I select a file it doesn’t do anything, doesn’t transfer the URL in the page to make the picture appear. Same thing with the Send page, it send the file but doesn’t put the link in the main page. Could it be a problem with the Javascript?
Thank you for your time.
Danny
i tried to implemented this.
but when i click browse server.
it always show a message:
The server didn’t reply with a proper XML data. Please check your configuration.
how can i fix this?
I used this tutorial so I could upgrade FCKEditor to CKEditor but use the same filemanager instead of upgrading to CKFinder.
Like many who have tried this method, I received the error “The server didn’t reply with a proper xml data” and was unable to upload photos.
Where I defined the Browser and Connection URLs, the tutorial above and many others that I read while searching for a solution used & for the ampersand. After tons of searching, I ended up switching this to just & (without the extra amp;).
Tutorial:
filebrowserImageBrowseUrl : ‘js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Image&Connector=http://www.mixedwaves.com/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php’,
Final:
filebrowserImageBrowseUrl : ‘/total/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Image&Connector=/total/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php’,
When I took out the amp; I received an actual error message stating that my path was incorrect (I had changed it at the suggestion of another “solution”). It turned out that the problem was literally the ampersand in my case, or at least that’s what it certainly seemed like.
Hope this helps somebody!
Penuel,
Thank you SO much for this awesome tutorial. I was beating my head against a wall for most of the night while trying to figure out ckEditor’s documentation.
I was able to implement the GetUrlParam function and the edited OpenFile function (I used the previous version with my fckEditor implementation).
I built a custom image browser that goes through my database table of uploaded images and simply builds a link using the function OpenFile(‘url_to_image’).
It works like a charm now!
Thanks again!
Great site,
however, one major problem is left untouched: the rightclick menu that normaly should pop up, and gives you options like rename or delete, plus a few other image informations, isn’t there.
I downloaded the working demo and just changed the config and paths. Is this function left out, or is it a problem on my site? I wonder, that noone else has brought up this isue.
Its not supported. The tutorial is about integrating the FCKeditor file manager with new CKEditor, but you can enhance the filebrowser or may try to integrate the newer version of filebrowser that has the functionality you require.
Hi Penuel,
Thanks for the tutorial! Great one!
I have installed and it work well, except for in page/Custom toolbar, doesn’t this support custom toolbar?
Thanks for your hard work and an easy to follow tutorial.
Worked like a charm!
Thanks Patrick, Glad it has been useful
@Deric, I am not sure which feature are you talking about.
Hi Penuel,
I am thankful to you for providing this code. I have downloaded your code and tried in my local system. The image uploading is working only when i am uploading from upload tab, but it is not working for image info and link. Because i think you gave in demo.html the following code..
filebrowserBrowseUrl :’js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Connector=http://kodemaster.co.cc/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php’,
filebrowserImageBrowseUrl : ‘js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Image&Connector=http://kodemaster.co.cc/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php’,
filebrowserFlashBrowseUrl :’js/ckeditor/filemanager/browser/default/browser.html?Type=Flash&Connector=http://kodemaster.co.cc/filemanager_in_ckeditor/js/ckeditor/filemanager/connectors/php/connector.php’,
So it is showing your online image directory structure. But when i tried to change it to my local image directory structure it is not working.
So can you please help me in this issue. When i click Imageinfo browse or link browser button it has to show my local directory structure. So how i have to do this..
Thanks Inadvance…
Raj
Hi Penuel,
I am thankful to for your script. I am able to upload images from upload option but i am unable to upload images from image info or link option. Because when i clicked brose option in images info or link tab it is showing your directory structure, because you gave your online link for browse option. But I want to view my directory structure, then only i can upload my images in my server. Can you please tel me where i need to change to see my directory structure..
Thanks Inadvance…
Raj Kiran
Hi Raj, Please make sure you changed the domains and path to match your domains. Also make sure you set the path in UserFiles variable in config.php. You can find instructions about it in the tutorial.
hey penuel first of fall congrats for the plugin . I am facing an issue here . I have deployed your example in apache and even in tomcat . In apache after editing demo.html for filebrowserBrowseUrl to my folder it works fine . but in tomcat I am getting ‘The server didn’t reply with a proper XML data. Please check your configuration’ . Is there any additional configuration required for tomcat . By the way which server have you used ?
Hi Sameer i don’t believe there is any specific configuration to run it on tomcat, but might be due to any platform diffs you might have to make some adjustments.. the best way to debug the problem is use firebug and I am sure you will pretty much get the idea of the problem.
ok fine i’ll debug . Can you tell me how can default tab in image plugin be upload (when we click on the image plugin default tab should be upload )
It works well, I have used classic ASP
Let me know, If anyone need help in asp.
Thanks,
Hetal