wao@cbnewsm.att.com (william.a.oswald) (12/06/90)
I'm thinking of buying a database manager but the topic of what is good and not so good has not come up recently. So, any body have any recommendations? How good is DBman, is it worth the money? By the way, my needs range from simple to complex and I would rather invest in a piece of software that I won't out grow. Thanks in advance Bill Oswald aloft!wao
Roger.Sheppard@bbs.actrix.gen.nz (12/06/90)
In article <1990Dec5.180612.12451@cbnewsm.att.com> wao@cbnewsm.att.com (william.a.oswald) writes: > I'm thinking of buying a database manager but the topic of what is > good and not so good has not come up recently. So, any body have any > recommendations? How good is DBman, is it worth the money? By the > way, my needs range from simple to complex and I would rather > invest in a piece of software that I won't out grow. > > Thanks in advance > Bill Oswald > aloft!wao Go for Adimends or some think like that, was on some of the Atari Flyers, and mentioned that the German Justice Dept: was using it, It was quoted some months back that Kuma (UK) were marketing it, 12,Horseshoe Park, Pangbourne, Berkshire RGB 7JW Phone No. 0734-844335 Fax: 0734-844339, ive herd that Dbman is a bag of worms, and not the same as Dbase at all.. -- Roger W. Sheppard 85 Donovan Rd, Kapiti New Zealand...
andyc@hplsla.HP.COM (Andy Cassino) (12/08/90)
wao@cbnewsm.att.com (william.a.oswald) writes: | | I'm thinking of buying a database manager but the topic of what is | good and not so good has not come up recently. So, any body have any | recommendations? How good is DBman, is it worth the money? By the | way, my needs range from simple to complex and I would rather | invest in a piece of software that I won't out grow. | ---------- I started out using Base Two for some simplistic needs and quickly outgrew it. I think it has a major limitation in that the only way to input data is manually. It doesn't import any format of file (not even ASCII). I switched to SuperBase Personal because of its numerous import/export options, which includes the DIF format (which Base Two thankfully exports) and Lotus 123 spreadsheets. Now that I've had it a few months, I'm not sure whether I would buy it again or not. Whereas it does import all these wonderful files, error checking is VERY POOR and the results are not 100%. Here are some examples: o import a DIF file with a record >256 chars and the import aborts with a generic error message - no clue as to the problem o import a LDW Power worksheet file before converting to Lotus format and the program bombs o dates are not properly imported from Lotus 123 files o converted LDW Power files are not properly imported; I have to load them into Lotus and re-save them before they'll import correctly Okay, so importation can be a hassle. Another hassle IMHO is that the program does not use the GEM file selector. The program has its own built-in extremely crude file selector dialogues that are probably slick on a DOS machine but very crude on the ST. These issues aside, I find the program to be reasonable to use and it looks tough to outgrow it (and I guess an upgrade to SuperBase Professional would solve that). And since the program exists on the Amiga and DOS machines and supposedly imports/exports dBase files, I feel reasonably confident that my databases can be ported to my next machine (whatever it is). Disclaimer: These are the opinions solely of the author, who has no pecuniary affiliation with the companies that sell the programs discussed. %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%% % Andy Cassino % % Hewlett-Packard - Lake Stevens Instrument Division % %%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
Yonderboy@cup.portal.com (Christopher Lee Russell) (12/09/90)
I am also interested in DBman.. Anybody have any experience with it..good or
bad... Does anybody know what the latest version is?
....yonderboy@cup.portal.comsilvert@cs.dal.ca (Bill Silvert) (12/09/90)
In article <1990Dec6.132542.15217@actrix.gen.nz> Roger.Sheppard@bbs.actrix.gen.nz writes: >In article <1990Dec5.180612.12451@cbnewsm.att.com> wao@cbnewsm.att.com >(william.a.oswald) writes: >> I'm thinking of buying a database manager but the topic of what is >> good and not so good has not come up recently. So, any body have any >> recommendations? How good is DBman, is it worth the money? By the >> way, my needs range from simple to complex and I would rather >> invest in a piece of software that I won't out grow. > >Go for Adimends or some think like that, was on some of the Atari >Flyers, and mentioned that the German Justice Dept: was using it, It >was quoted some months back that Kuma (UK) were marketing it, >12,Horseshoe Park, Pangbourne, Berkshire RGB 7JW >Phone No. 0734-844335 Fax: 0734-844339, ive herd that Dbman is a bag >of worms, and not the same as Dbase at all.. I'm not a dBASE user, although I've worked some with dBASE clones, and dBMAN seems fine to me. I have version V and it seems to do whatever I read about in the dBASE books I have. The main problem I have with it is that although it reads PC .DBF files fine, I can't get FoxPro or DBXL to import dBMAN files -- then again, I haven't tried hard. It would be interesting to hear from a more experienced database user. Also, since dBMAN runs on many different platforms, how compatible is the ST version with the Unix version and so on? -- William Silvert, Habitat Ecology Division, Bedford Inst. of Oceanography P. O. Box 1006, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, CANADA B2Y 4A2. Tel. (902)426-1577 UUCP=..!{uunet|watmath}!dalcs!biomel!bill BITNET=bill%biomel%dalcs@dalac InterNet=bill%biomel@cs.dal.ca
shipley@tron.UUCP (Bill Shipley) (12/11/90)
I think the latest version of DBman is 5.0 or 5.1. I have used an earlier version and found it very much like DBase III. It is a very powerful program, but I would not recommend it to someone who did not want to write customized applications. If you do write your own applications, the language has a number of features, some of which are not available in DBase. Bill Shipley
silvert@cs.dal.ca (Bill Silvert) (12/11/90)
In article <36712@cup.portal.com> Yonderboy@cup.portal.com (Christopher Lee Russell) writes: >I am also interested in DBman.. Anybody have any experience with it..good or >bad... Does anybody know what the latest version is? > I posted my favourable impressions recently. I'm not a data base expert, but it seems fine to me. My version, which I believe is current, is ver. V -- that is what I have seen advertised recently too. -- William Silvert, Habitat Ecology Division, Bedford Inst. of Oceanography P. O. Box 1006, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, CANADA B2Y 4A2. Tel. (902)426-1577 UUCP=..!{uunet|watmath}!dalcs!biomel!bill BITNET=bill%biomel%dalcs@dalac InterNet=bill%biomel@cs.dal.ca