Files Plugin

The Files plugin is AppStudio's file manager. You upload files, organize them in folders, tag them for easy lookup, and control exactly who can read, write, and delete. Files can then be shown in the app via Image, Video, Sound, Gallery, and Files widgets.

When to use this

• You need to upload and display media (images, video, audio) in the app
• You want to give users a document archive where they can upload and share files themselves
• You need to sign files with BankID — for example contracts or certificates
• You want to organize files with folder structure and tags
• You need granular access control — who can read, upload, edit, and delete

How it works

The Files plugin has three levels:

1. The file archive — the applet's root folder. Everything starts here.
2. Folders — arbitrary depth structure of subfolders. Each folder has its own permissions and an optional signature setting.
3. Files — the uploaded content. Each file has properties like name, description, tags, and thumbnail.

Permissions are set at the folder level and can be inherited down to subfolders and files.

To show files in the app, use widgets from the Files plugin — for example Files for an entire folder, Image for a specific image, or Gallery for multiple images.

Enable Files

1. Open your applet.
2. Go to Plugin Settings.
3. Turn on the Files plugin.
4. Save.

Once the plugin is enabled, the applet gets a File archive in the side menu.

The file archive

The file archive is the root of the folder structure. Every folder and file in an applet sits somewhere under the file archive.

Click File archive in the side menu to open the dashboard. You'll see three things:

• Subfolders — listed at the top.
• Files — listed below the folders.
• Toolbar — buttons for creating folders, uploading files, and searching.

Folders

Folders organize files. Every folder can contain subfolders and files, and every folder has its own settings.

Create a folder

1. Open the file archive or a subfolder.
2. Click Create folder.
3. Enter a name.
4. Save.

Folder settings

Click the gear icon on a folder to open Properties:

Setting	Description
Name	The folder's name. Required. The root folder is always named File archive and can't be renamed.
Number of files	Read-only — shows how many files are directly in the folder (not in subfolders).
Enable signatures	Turn on to allow files in the folder to be signed with BankID. When on, a Sign file / Sign all files button appears.
Created	Read-only — the date the folder was created.

Move and copy folders

In the dashboard:

1. Select the folders and files you want to move.
2. Click Move to or Copy in the toolbar.
3. Pick the destination folder.

Delete a folder

Select the folder and click the Delete icon. Deletion is permanent and takes every subfolder and file with it.

WARNING

Deleting a folder cannot be undone. Everything under the folder — subfolders, files, signatures — is gone.

Files

Files are the uploaded content. Each file has properties, tags, and an optional signature.

Upload a file

1. Open the folder where the file should go.
2. Click Upload file in the toolbar — or drag and drop the file directly onto the dashboard.
3. The file uploads and appears in the list.

You can upload multiple files at once by selecting several in the file picker or dragging them in as a group.

File types

The plugin recognizes four broad file types based on the file extension:

Type	Examples	Shown as
Image	JPG, PNG, GIF, WebP, SVG	Inline preview + thumbnail
Video	MP4, WebM, MOV	Inline video player
Audio	MP3, WAV, OGG, AAC	Inline audio player
Document	PDF, DOCX, XLSX, TXT, others	Thumbnail if available, otherwise a file icon

File properties

Click a file to open its detail view with its properties:

Setting	Description
Name	The file's name.
Description	Free text shown alongside the file.
Thumbnail	Image representing the file in lists and cards. For images, a thumbnail is generated automatically — for other file types you can upload one yourself.
Tags	Labels that make the file searchable and filterable in widgets like Gallery and Files.
Path	The permanent URL of the file. Click the copy icon to copy it to the clipboard.
Size	The file's size in KB. Read-only.
Created	The date the file was uploaded. Read-only.

Tags

Tags are free-form labels you put on files. Multiple tags are separated by commas. Tags have two important effects:

• Search and filter — files can be filtered by tags in the Files widget.
• Dynamic galleries — the Gallery widget can pull every image with specific tags. New images appear automatically as soon as they're tagged.

TIP

Decide on a short tag list early — event, product, news, policy. It's easy to end up with parallel variants (event, events, evenemang) that don't connect, and inconsistent tagging waters down filtering.

Delete a file

Open the file's detail view and click the Delete button at the bottom. Deletion is permanent.

Signatures (BankID)

Files can be signed with BankID — useful for contracts, certificates, and similar where a legally valid signature is required.

Enable signatures on a folder

1. Open the folder's Properties.
2. Turn on Enable signatures.
3. Save.

When signatures are enabled on a folder, files in the folder get two extra capabilities:

• A Sign file with BankID button in the file's detail view.
• A Sign all files with BankID button at the folder level to sign every file in one go.

Sign a file

1. Open the file.
2. Click Sign file with BankID.
3. Complete the signing in the BankID flow.

Once a file is signed it becomes read-only — name, description, thumbnail, and tags are locked, and the file can't be replaced. This is intentional: a signed file must be unchanged for the signature to remain valid.

Who has signed

The file's detail view lists every signature — the signer's name and the timestamp.

WARNING

A signed file cannot be edited or replaced. If the content needs to change you have to delete the file and upload a new one to be signed again.

Permissions

Permissions are set on folders and control who sees, writes, and deletes the content of the folder. Permissions can also be inherited down the folder tree.

See File and folder permissions for the full settings.

Show files in the app

To show files to end users, use widgets:

Widget	Use it for
Image	A single image from the file archive or a URL.
Gallery	Multiple images as a gallery or carousel, with optional tag filtering.
Sound	An audio file with a built-in player.
Video	A video file or embedded video.
Files	A whole folder from the file archive — users can browse, search, and possibly upload.

Example

Scenario: You're building an internal app where every employee sees a shared documents folder, sales can upload to their own folder, and HR has a private folder where they can sign employment contracts.

1. Enable the Files plugin in the applet.
2. Create the folders Shared, Sales, and HR-contracts under the file archive.
3. On Shared — everyone can read, no one can write. Put policy documents there.
4. On Sales — the sales group can read, write, and delete. Everyone else gets nothing.
5. On HR-contracts — only the HR group can read and write. Turn on Enable signatures.
6. When an employment contract is uploaded to HR-contracts, HR can sign it with BankID — after signing, the contract is read-only.
7. Add a Files widget on a page in the app pointing at Shared so every employee can easily reach the documents.

Tips

TIP

Use subfolders rather than long filenames. Shared/Policies/2024/IT-policy.pdf is easier to navigate than IT-policy-2024-shared.pdf in a flat structure.

TIP

Turn on Enable signatures only on the folders that really need it. That keeps regular files from being locked accidentally and keeps the signing flow focused.

TIP

For files meant to show in a specific widget — set a consistent tag and use Gallery or Files with tag filtering. The display updates automatically as you add new files.

Common mistakes

WARNING

Deleting a folder takes every subfolder and file with it permanently. Move the content first if you want to keep something.

WARNING

Signed files can't be edited or replaced. Think before starting the signing — if you have the wrong content, the file has to be deleted and replaced with a new one.

WARNING

Tags are case-sensitive and must match exactly in widgets that filter on them. Build a short tag vocabulary and stick to it.

WARNING

Enable signatures can't be turned on for the root folder (File archive) or for folders with system tags — only for regular subfolders.