Database Question

[Mirsky]

Hi. I'm curious if someone can recommend a database program.

I'm just starting to do some networking to find employment and I want
to keep track of everything. I'm using some strategies in a book I've
read.

But I want to create a database of companies and people. I'd like to be
able to relate the company and people to each other. So, for instance,
I want to have some information on Person A that includes the company
he works for (Company A). Then, when I look at the info for Company A,
Person A is already connected to that info. That is, I don't want to
have to manually create the connection again.

I'm not sure I'm being clear.

But I'm currently trying to figure out a workflow using Devonthink Pro,
which I own. It can do some of what I want, but not all. I can
associate a person with a company and vice versa, but I have to create
each connection, they're not automatically recipricol. Thanks.

[John Young]

In article <2012052414413932743-notmyemail@invalidemailcom>,

What do you want to pay FileMaker will do all you ask and more but it
may be over kill. I use it for some simple stuff just because I own it
and have one complex database with over 81000 records in it. Used to be
all kinds of help on the web for Filemaker but I haven't actively used
it for seven years. I did update as Lion demanded.

English has always been a challenge to me! Please forgive my bad grammar.
I do try.

[Patty Winter]

In article <2012052414413932743-notmyemail@invalidemailcom>,
Mirsky <not_my...@invalid.email.com> wrote:
>

> I want to create a database of companies and people. I'd like to be
>able to relate the company and people to each other. So, for instance,
>I want to have some information on Person A that includes the company
>he works for (Company A). Then, when I look at the info for Company A,
>Person A is already connected to that info. That is, I don't want to
>have to manually create the connection again.
>
>I'm not sure I'm being clear.

You're being very clear, Mirsky! I did exactly that with FileMaker Pro
a few years ago. Perhaps someone here can tell you whether the much
less expensive Bento would allow you to do the same.


Patty

[David Empson]

Bento 4 can do this (not sure about earlier versions - I think this was
added at some stage).

Given a table of companies and a table of people, you can have a
relationship between them which appears as a list on each record.

Looking at the record for a company with a layout showing the list of
related people, you can add an item in the list of people, which will
create a new record in the table of people. You can also call up a list
of all people and add a link to an existing record.

If you then look at the record for a person with a layout showing the
list of related companies, it will show the links that were created from
the other table.

You can link multiple people to multiple companies.

Bento should be fine for this sort of task (it basically a list manager
with the ability to create links between lists). It starts to fall short
if you need precise control over object positioning on layouts, complex
reports, or any kind of scripting to automate its operation.

--
David Empson
dem...@actrix.gen.nz

[Mike Dee]

Mirsky wrote:

> Hi. I'm curious if someone can recommend a database program.
>
> I'm just starting to do some networking to find employment and I
> want to keep track of everything. I'm using some strategies in a
> book I've read.
>
> But I want to create a database of companies and people. I'd like
> to be able to relate the company and people to each other. So, for
> instance, I want to have some information on Person A that
> includes the company he works for (Company A). Then, when I look
> at the info for Company A, Person A is already connected to that
> info. That is, I don't want to have to manually create the
> connection again.

OpenOffice or LibreOffice (Base module)

http://www.libreoffice.org/features/base/
or:
http://www.openoffice.org/product/base.html

Relational database, as easy/simple or as difficult as you want to
make it.

Freeware

--
dee

[Paul Magnussen]

Mike Dee wrote:

> http://www.openoffice.org/product/base.html
>
> Relational database, as easy/simple or as difficult as you want to
> make it.

Am I just looking in the wrong place, or does the documentation not
specify any minimum system requirements?

Paul Magnussen

[Wayne C. Morris]

In article <EtidnTREe8DHOSLS...@earthlink.com>,

System requirements are here:

<http://www.openoffice.org/dev_docs/source/sys_reqs_30.html>

[Simo...@canada.com]

In article <XnsA05EC88D...@emteedee.invalid>,

Actually, if you have it, Excel is not a BAD database....

S.

[Mike Dee]

And for LibreOffice you can find DL's for Mac OS from here
Intel Mac: <http://www.libreoffice.org/download/?type=mac-x86>
PPC Mac: <http://www.libreoffice.org/download/?type=mac-ppc>
PPC would indicate Tiger at least (couldn't find exact mins there,
sorry).

--
dee

[Paul Sture]

I would recommend looking at LibreOffice as well. The OpenOffice lot
seem to have stalled due to their transition from Oracle to Apache, but
the LibreOffice folks have been merrily bashing out new releases in that
time.

You do need Java for the database part of both products. I gather that
the LibreOffice folks are making an attempt to reduce this dependency,
but it will take time.

--
Paul Sture

[Patty Winter]

In article <Simon1952-88EE1...@news.newsgroupdirect.com>,

<Simo...@canada.com> wrote:
>
>Actually, if you have it, Excel is not a BAD database....

Wow, can Excel really do the kind of relational linking that
Mirsky needs?


Patty

[PhillipJones]

The only Decent relational Database in existence with a decent price is
FileMaker Pro.

[nospam]

In article <4fc0f985$0$87586$742e...@news.sonic.net>, Patty Winter

<pat...@wintertime.com> wrote:

> >Actually, if you have it, Excel is not a BAD database....
>
> Wow, can Excel really do the kind of relational linking that
> Mirsky needs?

it can't. excel is only good for very simple databases, basically just
a list of items.

[Fred Moore]

In article <p5l699-...@mint-hp.chingola.ch>,

Paul Sture <paul....@sture.ch> wrote:

> On Fri, 25 May 2012 08:25:13 -0700, Paul Magnussen wrote:
>
> > Mike Dee wrote:
> >
> >> http://www.openoffice.org/product/base.html
> >>
> >> Relational database, as easy/simple or as difficult as you want to make
> >> it.
> >
> > Am I just looking in the wrong place, or does the documentation not
> > specify any minimum system requirements?
> >
>
> I would recommend looking at LibreOffice as well. The OpenOffice lot
> seem to have stalled due to their transition from Oracle to Apache, but
> the LibreOffice folks have been merrily bashing out new releases in that
> time.

Hi Paul, as someone who uses NoeOffice/OpenOffice.org, the software
seems very mature. What sort of new goodies are the LibreOffice folks
adding that the average user might want? Don't tell me they've added
'normal view'?! (Hope against hope.)

--
If the women don't find you handsome, they should at least find you
handy.
--Red Green

[Wes Groleau]

Yes, it can—not that I would recommend it.

You are correct that “Excel is only good for very simple databases" but
VERY simple is how I would describe the stated requirements.

Person’s name in one column, company name in another, whatever you want
in as many additional columns you need.

Turn on the sorting filtering options on the header row, and any column
can be used to sort the whole table, and any column can filter to one or
more values. Custom filters can be even more sophisticated. And any
version of Excel newer than 2000 can handle over 32 thousand rows.

In my opinion, Excel might be a better choice than anything else
suggested so far _IF_ the person is already familiar with it. If not,
then one of the database programs suggested would be best _IF_ the
person is already familiar with it.

If not already familiar with something else, why not use a program
DESIGNED for this, i.e., Address Book.app ? If you have a Mac, you
already have it.

In the latest version, every entry has a place for a person's name and a
company name. Either can be left blank. If both are filled, you can
individually select whether to show company or name in the index.

There is a search box that can be used to hide/show items on the list by
company name, or other fields. There is room for all sorts of phone
numbers, e-mail addresses, postal addresses, and more, including a
free-form "Notes" field.

--
Wes Groleau

I've noticed lately that the paranoid fear of computers becoming
intelligent and taking over the world has almost entirely disappeared
from the common culture. Near as I can tell, this coincides with
the release of MS-DOS.
— Larry DeLuca

[Paul Sture]

There is a bug logged about "Normal View"

<https://bugs.freedesktop.org/show_bug.cgi?id=37967>

New features and fixes for 3.4 and 3.5:

<http://www.libreoffice.org/download/3-4-new-features-and-fixes/>
<http://www.libreoffice.org/download/3-5-new-features-and-fixes/>


--
Paul Sture

[Fred Moore]

In article <qmkg99-...@mint-hp.chingola.ch>,

Thanks for the info Paul. I'll read up on it as soon as I have time.

As to normal view, it's been flagged as a bug in OOo forever. Evidently,
providing it will take a fundamental recoding of the app, or so the
developers claim. So, I don't expect it soon, if ever.

[Paul Sture]

One feature I really do like about LibreOffice over OpenOffice is that if
you are working with, say an XLS file, when you come to save it there's a
different dialog which allows you to say "Yes, I really do want to keep
the original format". OO wanted to save the file in its own format, and
you had to put more effort into saving it as XLS.

Oh, and LibreOffice allows a million rows in a spreadsheet. The last
versions of either OO or Excel were limited to 64K rows.

While I don't have the requirement to work with a *spreadsheet* so large,
it can very handy for data conversions.

--
Paul Sture