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Re: [LUG] Databases part 3

 

Neil Winchurst wrote:
> Well, I have been looking at knoda database frontend, mainly with
> mysql. I am starting to get the hang of it all, even though I would
> prefer to be using an all-in-one type of database, which, as I have
> mentioned before, does not exist in Linux yet.
>   
I'm not sure it exists elsewhere either, for reasonable values of "all
in one".
Is the call actually for a _solution_ here?

> However, an appeal to all you database experts out there. One of the
> most important and useful tools for a database is the search. No, not a
> query, a search. For example, I have a database with say 10,000
> records. I need to look at one particular record, and I know that the
> reference code is eg AB217.
Again, this may not be exactly what everyone calls a database... and it
may be best to specify what sort of database it is.

A database I use and have extended from time to time currently contains
around 150 tables.

The idea that there is a reference code which returns one record from
that database doesn't really fit.

A code such as 2000 given to a specific program which operates on that
database will return a view of the entire record relating to a specific
person, but this is pages long, categorised and requiring navigation to
make sense of.

One specific table of that database is restricted to one line (synonym:
record) per person and thus searching that table for that person's ID or
a unique foreign key we hold will bring up one record..

but if that was all I wanted, I'd be using a flat file, and grep.  What
sort of information is in the database, and of what is a record composed?

-- 
A

>  There should be a 'search' button or
> perhaps a key combination which brings up a 'Search for a record'
> window. I can then enter the search key (in my example AB217) and press
> enter. I am then taken straight to the relevant record which appears on
> the screen for me to examine.
>
> I can't find anything like that in any of the databases that I have
> looked at, or perhaps I have missed something. Incidently, all the
> Windows databases that I have ever used included a method of searching
> for one particular record. And the facility to use wild keys (usually
> the asterisk and the question mark) was always included too. I just do
> not see how it is possible to use a database without this facility. And
> no, a query will not do the job, it has a quite different purpose in
> life.
>
>   


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