--- title: 'Dashboard' description: 'Accessing the Dashboard!' position: 500 category: 'Product' menuTitle: 'Dashboard' --- ## Setup Your First Super Admin Once you have started NocoDB, you can visit the dashboard via `example.com`. You will be redirected to `example.com/#/signup`. Enter your work email and your password. image Your password has at least 8 letters. No other constraints on case, numbers or special characters. ## Initialize Your First Project Once you have logged into NocoDB, you should see `My Projects`. ![Screenshot 2022-12-29 at 2 54 43 PM](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/86527202/209932699-743ffea2-986f-443f-8198-f56b597de706.png) To create a new project, you can click `New Project`. You need to specify the project name. The data will be stored in `NC_DB`. If it is not specified, a local SQLite will be created and used. NC_DB is an environment variable used to store the meta data in the given database. ![Screenshot 2022-12-29 at 2 54 57 PM](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/86527202/209932936-8fe7334c-1a94-4073-ba19-478efb620808.png) ### Connecting to External Database Click on three-dot menu adjacent to `BASES`. Pick required database option from the menu `Connect to new datasource`. Tip: If you are running NocoDB on Docker and your local DB is running on your host machine, your Host Address would be host.docker.internal instead of localhost. ![Screenshot 2022-12-29 at 2 55 39 PM](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/86527202/209933294-9327ff16-21db-4aca-bf16-8cea8a1eb415.png) Above menu is also accessible from `Team & Settings` > `Data Sources`. Click on `New` button to add existing database. ![Screenshot 2022-12-29 at 3 16 36 PM](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/86527202/209936942-f82a293f-2e91-48da-b9cd-79ec143d7d6f.png) You need to specify the project name, API type, and other database parameters. ![Screenshot 2022-12-29 at 2 56 25 PM](https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/86527202/209933326-e76eee13-4942-4ba8-b184-a28099c089ab.png) Currently it supports MySQL, Postgres, MSSQL and SQLite. You can also configure associated SSL & advanced parameters. image Tip: You can click Edit Connection JSON and modify SSL settings in "ssl". ```json { "client": "pg", "connection": { "host": "", "port": "5432", "user": "", "password": "", "database": "", "ssl": { "require": true, "rejectUnauthorized": false, "sslMode": "no-verify" } } } ``` Tip: You can click Edit Connection JSON and specify the schema you want to use in "searchPath". ```json { "client": "pg", "connection": { ... }, "searchPath": [ "" ] } ``` Click `Test Database Connection` to see if the connection can be established or not. NocoDB creates a new **empty database** with specified parameters if the database doesn't exist. image