OH - Open Hospital (https://www.open-hospital.org/) is a free and open-source Health Information Management System (HIMS) software application. Open Hospital is deployed as a desktop application that can be used in a standalone, single user mode (PORTABLE mode) or in a client / server network configuration (CLIENT mode), where multiple clients and users connect to the same database server.
OH is developed in Java and it is based on open-source tools and libraries; it runs on any computer, requires low resources and is designed to work without an internet connection.
Open Hospital is the first of a set of software applications that ISF - Informatici Senza Frontiere (https://www.informaticisenzafrontiere.org/) has developed to support the information management and the activities of hospitals and health centers in the simplest manner possible, by providing tools for the administrative operations (like registering patients, manage laboratory analysis and pharmaceutical stocks) and to produce detailed statistics and reports. It was first deployed in 2006 at the St. Luke Hospital in Angal (Uganda) and it is now used in dozens of different locations around the world.
When OH is used in PORTABLE mode, it is easily possible to move the installation on another computer or even run it from a USB stick or drive. All you have to do is to copy the root installation directory of OH to your favourite folder, where the program and all the data are kept. OH uses its own version of the Java Virtual Machine (JRE) and the MariaDB/MySQL server. OH is released under the GNU GPL 3.0 License.
The Linux version has been tested on different distributions and versions, including Ubuntu 16.04 i386 (32bit) and up to Ubuntu 22.04 x64 (64bit). The Windows version has been tested on Windows 7/10/11 (64bit)
- Download Open Hospital package for the desired architecture
- Unzip/untar the package
- Browse to the extracted folder
- start OH by running ./oh.sh
- to see available options, run ./oh.sh -h
-----------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| Open Hospital - 1.14.0 |
| |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
arch x86_64 | lang en | mode PORTABLE | log level INFO | Demo off
------------------------------------------------------------------
EXPERT MODE activated
API server set to off
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Usage: oh.sh -[OPTION]
-C set OH in CLIENT mode
-P set OH in PORTABLE mode
-S set OH in SERVER mode (portable)
-l [ en|fr|es|it|pt|ar ] -> set language
-E toggle EXPERT MODE - show advanced options
-h show help
-q quit
--------------------------------
EXPERT MODE - advanced options
-A toggle API server - EXPERIMENTAL
-e export/save OH database
-r restore OH database
-d toggle log level INFO/DEBUG
-G setup GSM
-D initialize OH with Demo data
-i initialize/install OH database
-m configure database connection manually
-s save OH configuration
-t test database connection (CLIENT mode only)
-u create Desktop shortcut
-v show configuration
-V check for latest OH version
-X clean/reset OH installation
- double click on the oh.bat batch file and choose among available options:
-----------------------------------------------------------------
| |
| Open Hospital - 1.14.0 |
| |
-----------------------------------------------------------------
arch x86_64 | lang en | mode PORTABLE | log level INFO | Demo off
-----------------------------------------------------------------
EXPERT MODE activated
API server set to off
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Usage: oh.ps1 [ -lang en|fr|it|es|pt|ar ]
[ -mode PORTABLE|CLIENT ]
[ -loglevel INFO|DEBUG ]
[ -interactive on|off ]
[ -generate_config on|off ]
C set OH in CLIENT mode
P set OH in PORTABLE mode
S set OH in SERVER mode (portable)
l [ en|fr|es|it|pt|ar ] -> set language
E toggle EXPERT MODE - show advanced options
h show help
q quit
--------------------------------
EXPERT MODE - advanced options
A toggle API server - EXPERIMENTAL
e export/save OH database
r restore OH database
d toggle log level INFO/DEBUG
G setup GSM
D initialize OH with Demo data
i initialize/install OH database
m configure database connection manually
s save OH configuration
t test database connection (CLIENT mode only)
u create Desktop shortcut
v show configuration
V check for latest OH version
X clean/reset OH installation
Note: The oh.bat launches the oh.ps1 startup file automatically. The script presents the interactive menu that can be used to setup and choose how to run Open Hospital.
-> To manually run oh.ps1 (powershell script):
- right-click on oh.ps1 -> Properties -> General -> Security
- select "Unblock"
- right click on oh.ps1 and select "Run with Powershell"
- if asked for permission to execute the script select "Allow"
- choose among available options
It might be necessary to set the correct permissions / exclusions also in the Windows Security Center, to allow OH to communicate on the MySQL / MariaDB local TCP port.
-> To run oh.ps1 directly from command line:
powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ./oh.ps1 [options]
-> To run oh.ps1 with command line options (example):
./oh.ps1 -lang it -mode PORTABLE -loglevel DEBUG -interactive off -generate_config on
- C set Open Hospital to start in CLIENT mode, usually when an external database server is used (Client / Server configuration)
- P set Open Hospital to start in PORTABLE mode, where data is saved locally
- S set Open Hospital to start in SERVER mode: the local portable instance of MariaDB is launched to act as a portable database server
- l set local language: en|fr|it|es|pt|ar
- E toggle EXPERT MODE: used to show advanced options and features. Use at your own risk!
- h show help
- q quit (windows only)
- A toggle API server: activate and start openhospital api jetty server - EXPERIMENTAL
- e export / save / dump the Open Hospital database in sql format
- r restore Open Hospital database from backup or external sql file: user will be prompted for input sql file
- d toggle log level between INFo and DEBUG - useful to execute OH in debug mode in order to log errors or bugs with more extended informations to log file
- G setup GSM modem to enable sms interaction
- D initialize OH database with Demo data - loads a demo database in order to test the software
- i initialize / install OH database
- m configure OH database connection settings manually
- s save / write / generate OH configuration files (oh/rsc/*.properties) and exit
- t test database connection to the configured database server (Client mode only)
- u create Desktop shortcut with current params (Windows / Linux)
- v show Open Hospital external software version and configuration
- V create online for latest OH version released
- X clean/reset OH installation by deleting all data and configuration files -> use with caution <-
Some advanced options can be configured manually by editing the scripts (oh.sh and oh.ps1 - do not modify oh.bat unless legacymode is used) and setting the specific script variables. This might also be useful to set different combinations of options (language, debug level, ...) for specific needs.
############## OH general configuration - change at your own risk :-) ##############
#
# -> OH_PATH is the directory where Open Hospital files are located
# OH_PATH="c:\Users\OH\OpenHospital\oh-1.14"
# Interactive mode
# set INTERACTIVE_MODE to "off" to launch oh.ps1 without calling the user
# interaction menu (script_menu). Useful if automatic startup of OH is needed.
# In order to use this mode, setup all the OH configuration variables in the script
# or pass arguments via command line.
$script:INTERACTIVE_MODE="on"
It is possibile to set the WRITE_CONFIG_FILES option to "on" to regenerate the OH configuration files at startup (this is also possibile by selecting the g script option). The default is set to off, so the configuration files are not regenerated and overwritten at every startup. This is useful for production environment where the configuration is fixed.
# set WRITE_CONFIG_FILES=on "on" to force generation / overwriting of configuration files:
# data/conf/my.cnf and oh/rsc/*.properties files will be regenerated from the original .dist files
# with the settings defined in this script.
#
# Default is set to "off": configuration files will not be generated or overwritten if already present.
#
WRITE_CONFIG_FILES="off" # linux
$script:WRITE_CONFIG_FILES="off" # windows
####################### OH configuration #########################
OH_MODE=PORTABLE # set functioning mode to CLIENT | PORTABLE | CLIENT # linux
$script:OH_MODE="PORTABLE" # windows
# Language setting - default set to en
OH_LANGUAGE=en # fr es it pt ar # linux
$script:OH_LANGUAGE="en" # fr es it pt ar # windows
# set log level to INFO | DEBUG - default set to INFO
LOG_LEVEL=INFO # linux
$script:LOG_LEVEL="INFO" # windows
# set DEMO_DATA to on to enable demo database loading - default set to off
# -> Warning -> __requires deletion of all portable data__
DEMO_DATA=off # linux
$script:DEMO_DATA="off" # windows
# set JAVA_BIN
# Uncomment this if you want to use system wide JAVA
#JAVA_BIN=`which java` # linux
#$script:JAVA_BIN="C:\Program Files\JAVA\bin\java.exe" # windows
If a database server hostname/address is specified (other then localhost), OH can be started in CLIENT mode and used in a client/server / LAN environment.
##################### Database configuration #######################
DATABASE_SERVER=localhost
DATABASE_PORT=3306
DATABASE_ROOT_PW="xxxxxxxxxx"
DATABASE_NAME=oh
DATABASE_USER=isf
DATABASE_PASSWORD="xxxxx"
# path and directories
OH_DIR="oh"
OH_DOC_DIR="../doc"
OH_SINGLE_USER="yes" # set "no" for multiuser
CONF_DIR="data/conf"
DATA_DIR="data/db"
PHOTO_DIR="data/photo"
BACKUP_DIR="data/dump"
LOG_DIR="data/log"
SQL_DIR="sql"
SQL_EXTRA_DIR="sql/extra"
TMP_DIR="tmp"
# imaging / dicom
DICOM_MAX_SIZE="4M"
DICOM_STORAGE="FileSystemDicomManager" # SqlDicomManager
DICOM_DIR="data/dicom_storage"
# logging
LOG_FILE=startup.log
OH_LOG_FILE=openhospital.log
API_LOG_FILE="api.log"
# SQL creation files
DB_CREATE_SQL="create_all_en.sql" # default to en
DB_DEMO="create_all_demo.sql"
The scripts takes care of creating all the needed data directories and configuration files. Everything is also parametric and user adjustable in the scripts with variables (or via command line options). The default folder structure is now clean, simple and common to all distros:
/oh -> Open Hospital distribution
/sql -> containing the SQL creation scripts
/data/conf -> configuration files for database (MariaDB / MySQL)
Created at runtime:
/tmp
data/db
data/dicom_storage
data/dump
data/log
data/photo
External software package downloaded at first run:
Mariadb 10.x.x server
Java JRE, Zulu or OpenJDK distribution
Administrator and User manuals are available in the doc folder. Online versions of the manuals can be found on the Open Hospital website
If you experience problems in starting up the script, avoid long folder path and path with special characters / spaces in it.
- If you get one of these errors:
Error on creating OH Database error while loading shared libraries: libncurses.so.5.
Error: MySQL root password not set! Exiting
You have to install the ncurses librares, on Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get install libncurses5
- If you get this error:
Error Initializing MySQL database on port 3306 error while loading shared libraries: libaio.so.1.
You have to install the libaio libraries, on Ubuntu:
sudo apt-get install libaio1
- If you select languages en-fr-it, a ICD10 patologies subset is loaded at startup, languages es-pt don't.
Suggested method is to use the "u" script option to create a Windows Desktop shortcut for OH. Follow these instruction to create it manually:
Method 1 (with launch parameters configured in oh.ps1)
- Rigth click on Desktop
- New Shortcut
- Browse to OH folder location and select oh.bat
- Assign a name to the shortcut
- Right click on the shortcut and select Properties
- Change icon
- Specify a different file
- Browse to OH folder location and select oh.ico
- Apply
Method 2 (with launch parameters stored on execution command)
- Rigth click on Desktop
- New Shortcut
- Browse to OH folder location and select oh.ps1
- Assign a name to the shortcut
- Right click on the shortcut and select Properties
- Change icon
- Specify a different file
- Browse to OH folder location and select oh.ico
- Modify Target with
C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ./oh.ps1
- Apply
Option parameters can be added at the end of Target string separated by spaces, example:
C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File ./oh.ps1 -loglevel DEBUG
Powershell minimun version 5.1 is required to run oh.ps1. To install Powershell 5.1 go to https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=54616
If you get this error:
+ CategoryInfo : NotSpecified: (:) [], PSSecurityException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : RuntimeException or UnauthorizedAccess
- Start Windows PowerShell with the "Run as Administrator" option. Only members of the Administrators group on the computer can change the execution policy. Enable running unsigned scripts by entering:
set-executionpolicy remotesigned
- You might also be required to enable access on Windows Firewall to oh.ps1 and/or to the TCP port used for the local database (PORTABLE mode).
It's also possible to start Open Hospital with the legacy batch file (old oh.bat behaviour):
- open cmd.exe, browse to the OH installation directory and run .\oh.bat -legacymode
- to see available options in legacymode, run .\oh.bat -h
(*) If you are using oh.bat in legacy mode, you might have to download and unzip java ad mysql manually.
In order to download and unzip Java:
- Visit https://cdn.azul.com/zulu/bin/
- download the latest JRE for your architecture:
x64 - 64bit: https://cdn.azul.com/zulu/bin/zulu17.48.15-ca-jre17.0.10-win_x64.zip
x86 - 32bit: https://cdn.azul.com/zulu/bin/zulu17.48.15-ca-jre17.0.10-win_i686.zip
- unzip the downloaded file into the base directory where OpenHospital has been placed.
In order to download and unzip MariaDB:
- Visit https://mariadb.org/download/
- Select the Operating System: Windows
- Select package type: ZIP file
- Select CPU (architecture) 32 / 64
- Download the zip file:
x86 - 32bit: https://archive.mariadb.org/mariadb-10.6.5/win32-packages/mariadb-10.6.5-win32.zip
x64 - 64bit: https://archive.mariadb.org/mariadb-10.6.16/winx64-packages/mariadb-10.6.16-winx64.zip
- unzip the downloaded file into the base directory where OpenHospital has been placed.
Check online documentation.
last updated: 2024.02.01