"?" wrote in message
rg...
On Fri, 14 Oct 2005 02:38:41 GMT in RSE3f.24186$wm3.19828@trnddc01 J
Fortuna wrote:
"?" wrote in message
rg...
Snip

In response to:
I currently keep a spread sheet.
snip
I'm somewhat tempted to move to a "real database".

I too started with a spreadsheet for my orchid info, and when I finally
moved to the database, I wished that I had done it a long time ago. Do
think
more about it. It's definitely worth it. OrchidKitty's email shows some
of
the really cool stuff that one can do with a database -- OrchidKitty, I
am
really impressed! Even for less complex data, a database can be much more
organized and flexible than a spreadsheet. And the more data you have,
the
more awkward the spreadsheet becomes. How many orchids do you have now,
Chris?

I agree that databases tend to work much better than spread sheets.
However, databases cannot be maintained for weeks on end with a printout
and a pencil or pen :-).
Moving to a database has been hindered by laziness and cheapness.
Open Office currently lacks something equivalent to access and rolling
my own database is going to lead to a tangent on generating tables for
printout and attempt #3 at writing a GUI app.

Well, you coud try MySQL. It is free, and if you get the administration app
available for it, creating new tables is as easy as it is in MS Access. I
have worked with both. MySQL is, though, a more serious, production quality
DB and so, for ease of entering data, and then viewing it, you'd need to
create a GUI App. You say you've tried to create a GUI App a couple times.
May I ask using what, and in what programming language? It is quite easy,
now, to create GUI applications using products like NetBeans (free from
www.netbeans.org) and Suns Java SDK (free from Sun). It is hard to beat
free. If you want to give it a try, using NetBeans and Java, and you get
stuck, just ask and I'll try to help you. But since I try to earn a living
doing this, I can't guarantee an instantaneous response. A terrific
resource for you are those Usenet newsgroups focussed on computer
programming, but again patience is sometimes required.

The fact is that spreadsheets are modelling tools, wholly inappropriate for
trying to maintain a database. But it is tempting to abuse them in this way
because it is so easy to use them to manage data. Using a spreadsheet to
manage data, though, is rather like using a hammer to drive a screw. You
can do it, but doing so is usually harder, and always less efficient, than
using the right tool, and it will eventually lead to significant problems.

I'd wager that Open Office doesn't have something like MS Access largely
because there are several open source DB products including, but not limited
to, MySQL and postgres.

Cheers,

Ted


--
R.E. (Ted) Byers, Ph.D., Ed.D.
R & D Decision Support Solutions
http://www.randddecisionsupportsolutions.com/
Healthy Living Through Informed Decision Making