Art museum database (Microsoft Access)
Paintstik
We use MS Access at Dale Chihuly Studio to catalog all the work produced
there. While it is fairly versatile I do not think that it is the best
thing out there for this purpose. Our database suffers from never having
a proper design produced by a database designer. The administration at the
studio believes that I should be able to accomplish any needed design
changes just because they sent me to a basic training class at CompUSA.
This is laughable. It is the difference between knowing how to drive a
car and how to fix a car.
I know of no "template" for Access which you could use but, you could
refer to Museum Registration Methods to get an idea of what fields you
want in your tables. But before you put alot of effort into using Access,
I would check into other software specifically designed to catalog art
collections. The database design process for Access can be more work than
cataloging your collection in my humble opinion.
Don Hudgins
Registrar
Chihuly Studio, Seattle, WA
Richard Gerrard
Hi,
we've been using Access for a couple of years now and have developed
several systems for managing collections management information related
to our collections. If you can define what you are trying to do a
little more specifically (object-level catalogue/inventory, accession
file, etc.) I'd be happy to send you the background on what we've done.
You can respond to me off-list at rger...@epas.utoronto.ca
Richard Gerrard
Registrar, Colelctions Management
Heritage Toronto
Stephen Ringle
We transferred all data in our old, DOS text based database to Access this
past spring. The database structure and much of the user interface was
designed by me, with input from computer science faculty here at the
University of Maine. We also enlisted the aid of a C.S. major to do much of
the "coding" and to assist with the receiving end of the data transfer.
Most of what we have accomplished so far works great. But when I
want to add features or enhance forms or facilitate routine actions, learning
the program is a real challenge. I often turn to the Computer Science
faculty for assistance.
My advice is: if you're not on a campus where help is handy, don't build it
yourself, unless you want something extreemly simple. (I tend to want to try
very sophisticated actions, like automatic lookups if an entery fails to
bring up a valid object record, with understandable error messages, cascading
updates to current-location and location-history tables, etc.) Otherwise,
convince your superiors to invest in the Willoughby Group's Snap for windows,
or some other off the shelf collection management software which has support
groups and help lines you can call. Current software is sufficiently
sophisticated for users, without pretending to be programmers.
My 2c.
In article <33EB28...@epas.utoronto.ca>, rger...@EPAS.UTORONTO.CA
says...
--
============================================================
Stephen B. Ringle, Registrar a...@maine.maine.edu
University of Maine Museum of Art
5712 Carnegie Hall, Room 109 vox: 207-581-3257
Orono, Maine 04469-5712 fax: 207-581-3083
============================================================
Lenore Sarasan
If a museum really wants to try to develop their own system, I would
recommend using FileMaker Pro rather than Access as it is easier to use for
creating a simple functioning system than is Access. If you are just going
to be doing data entry initially, you might consider a DOS-based system as a
DOS-based system is much faster to use for initial data entry than a
Windows-based system.
Any commercial system, such as our (Willoughby's) SNAP! for Windows which is
based on Access or our SNAP! for DOS which is based on Q&A, will have
involved man-months if not man-years of development by experienced
programmers and is not something you can duplicate easily in your spare
time. And, of course, it's not just time that is required to get it right
but some familiarity with the tools. If you hire a student or local
programmer to develop a system for you, you have to weigh the economics of
what you will have to pay them compared to the cost of a commercial system
(our SNAP! for Windows is $3995, SNAP! for DOS is $1595) as well as the
usefulness of the end product. I.e., how many days of your time or a local
programmer's time does this represent and can he/she replicate the
functionality of a commercial system within this timeframe and does doing it
yourself outweigh the inherent advantages of going with a commercial system
(support, user group, adherence to museum standards, free upgrades, etc.).
On the other hand, developing your own system will provide you with a deeper
understanding of data issues, of your own data, it's fun (for awhile) to do,
and since many museums do not view staff salaries as an expenditure, it may
be the only route open to you. If anyone is interested in seeing a
straightforward yet fairly comprehensive design for a museum automation
system, just write to us for our SNAP! for DOS 50-page description or visit
our web site (willo.com). The fields we incorporated into SNAP! for DOS
were based on an extensive analysis of over 120 manual documentation systems
and the fields represent over 99% of the data that is typically recorded in
the primary source document of any museum (catalogue card, ledger book,
etc.). While the design of SNAP! for DOS is proprietary and I'm not
encouraging you to take it and replicate it, it will give you an idea of the
kinds of elements that might be included in an entry-level system and the
features and functions you might want to consider incorporating (help
messages, pop-up lists, validation, etc.).
Another potential list of fields for inclusion in a do-it-yourself system
may be found in the Museum Documentation Association's (MDA) Spectrum
document. The MDA is in the UK. Their web site is
http://www.open.gov.uk/mdocassn/index.htm. Spectrum is a museum
documentation standard and is written for use in both manual and automated
systems so it's primarily a list of what information you should record about
objects rather than a list of fields derived from these broader categories
for inclusion in an automated system but Spectrum is an amazing document
(also available in electronic form) and will be useful to anyone responsible
for maintaining object documentation.
Lenore Sarasan
Willoughby Associates, Limited
The Museum Automation People
266 Linden Street
Winnetka, Illinois 60093
http://www.willo.com (WEB)
847 866-0401 (VOICE)
847 866-0409 (FAX)
>
>Date: Thu, 14 Aug 1997 18:15:01 GMT
>From: Stephen Ringle <A...@MAINE.MAINE.EDU>
>Subject: Re: Art museum database (Microsoft Access)
rhi...@kona.net
If you are looking for inexpensive museum collection management system you should check out Pastime 2000 Software. My company just spent the last year developing this program. We used Microsoft Visual Foxpro which is like industrial strength MS Access. I am a professional programmer and spent hundreds of hours collaborating with museum collection managers to develop the software which has just become available for purchase. The program provides cataloging for objects, archives, photos and library materials. It comes with Chenhall Nomenclature built in. Pastime also automates the accession process creating accession and deed of gift forms and even a thank you letter to the donor. Pastime can be equipped with Digital Imaging allowing you to scan, view and print digitized images of items in your collection. If you are a non profit organization, you can start using Pastime for $495. For a demonstration, check out the web site at:
http://www.pastime2000.com/
Richard L. Hilton, President
Pasitme Software Company, Inc.
On Thu, 07 Aug 1997 12:43:28 GMT, kaj...@tardis.svsu.edu (Jim Kajpust) wrote:
> I'm a volunteer at our local (and small) art museum. Does anyone know
> of a source for a template for using Access to store an art inventory?
> Or lacking that, is there a certain amount of info, in any certain
> form that the database should contain?
>
> Being basically lazy at heart, if there is any thing out there
> (hopefully for free) that I can use rather than setting up a new one,
> I would be very happy.
>
>
> Jim Kajpust - Personal Freedoms - Michigan
> www.svsu.edu/~kajpust
>
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