Technology Time

[Valerie MacEwan]

I'll start.
What tools do you use?
iMac w/Mac OS 10.4.1
(also Linux w/SuSE)
HP C4180 Photosmart All-in-One copier
Epson Photo R280 printer
Sony DSC-F707 camera
iPhoto for images
Seashore for photo editing (or GIMP)

I need a recommendation for a decent database to use for my collection. I don't want to build one myself (using Access or something). What do you use? I downloaded a trial copy of the books edition of collectorz.com software.

[Gary Roberts]

I use BookPedia from Bruji software. I prefer it to Collectorz as it has a wider set of databases to choose from, is fairly customizable and integrates with .Mac or MobileMe or whatever they are going to call it next week ( I stuck with .mac as my address... I refuse to use .me ). I also am trying out Bento from Filemaker which seems to have some interesting possibilities.

Other than that, the tools of the trade are:

Mac Pro Tower Dual Core and all that stuff, 10.5.4
iMac Intel 10.5.4
Mutt Windows PC (although I'm now also running Windows XP on the Mac Pro)
MacBook Pro (new toy for me)
HP Laserjet printer
Epson 4490 photo scanner
Fujitsu fi-4120C ADF scanner
Microtek i800 legal size scanner
Plustek Opticbook scanner
Panasonic Lumix cameras (forgot which ones)
Olympus camera (forgot which one)
Photoshop Elements 6 Mac & Windows
Acrobat Pro 9 Mac (Pro Extended 9 at work)
Graphic Converter (couldn't do without it)
Freeway Pro (website software)
Typepad (for the blogs)
Pages 08
MS Word
Bento (trying it out)
BookPedia
DVDPedia
Shoebox (I dislike iPhoto. The new Photoshop Elements 6 Bridge may replace Shoebox for me)
And if anyone is wondering, I work in the Library and Archives of an engineering research lab, hence to preponderance of toys for me to play with.

[Frank DeFreitas]

I have several Mac G4's. I run OS 10.4.1 and also OS9 (I also have an 8650 workgroup server that still runs OS8).

SONY DSC-S60 for the web

MAMIYA C3 for medium format film

Adobe Photoshop for images

Avid on the video workstation for video

Deck II for audio on the audio workstation

I, too, am interested in hearing about database software. I already have Filemaker Pro in OS9.

[Gary Roberts]

Frank... the problem I find with Collectorz and BookPedia packages is that I can't play around with the font layout. The font size/type is tied into the OS operating system and not adjustable. I've talked to both companies about it, but they can't do anything at this point. My aging eyes would prefer 14 pt at the least!

Bento is interesting in that it's relatively inexpensive, has some stripped down Filemaker Pro features, although it lacks the relational DB part. You also can't make templates to trade with other people, which is a drawback.

For now, I am sticking with Bookpedia. The company does frequent updates, the ability to cross check multiple international library and book seller DB's is great, multiple items can be searched and deleted, etc. A few non-intuitive functions survive as of yet, which is annoying.

[Valerie MacEwan]

It's the awesome task of getting started -- trying to catalog what is in this house. I have over 15K photos taken over the last 10 years and all these pieces of ephemera that should be scanned - ads, magazines, letters, deeds, journals... and then there are the books to catalog (I am a book reviewer, get tons of books) AND THEN all these old b&w photos I bought at flea markets. Started sorting through things today using broad umbrella categories and will go from there to the database, I suppose. What I'd like to do is scan the item, database needs where purchased, what it is, date... condition... price... maybe I'll have to build my own db but it's been years since I did that, Windows 98 in Access. I have papers, manuscripts, diaries, all kinds of items. And record albums...

I'm not a geek but I've had to become one... Microsoft kept letting me down.

[Gary Roberts]

Valerie

I feel for you. I'm in the same position... adding books, antique tools, art pottery, DVD's etc.

But... I'm working out in my head how to bring my training in Archives into play to produce a work flow that makes sense. I'll give it some thought and start to bounce ideas over here

[Valerie MacEwan]

Exactly! I haven't built a database for archival "stuff" since 1991 and that was in DOS and for a big microfilm project of student files. I did just find an interesting open source project - Books. I'm going to try it out. It's here

*There's got to be a way to do links in this discussion format and have them open in another tab instead of the current one, eh?

[Nancy]

Well I have looked all over the internet and so far I have not found a good database for photograph collections or vintage paper.
I did fine a fee data base at this site http://www.getlibra.com/
But it is for books , dvd's, music, and games--
I stated using the book area for photographs seems to work ok-
But I would like to find a good database for vintage photographs
Nancy

[Valerie MacEwan]

maybe we'll have to build one... urgh. I don't even have Access anymore. When I try to use my scanner software to catalog what I scan, it freezes.

[Frank DeFreitas]

I had a little time in-between meetings today to play around with filemaker and, believe it or not, the one that seems to meet my needs the best is a sample template for employee records. All I would need to do is change the names of the entry fields.

For instance, each record has a place for the employee picture. I would just change that to show the piece of ephemera. I would change the "employee name" field to "name of item", and so on and so forth. There's a place in each record for comments, so I could use that to write a little about each piece.

Other fields, such as zip code could be changed to "year if known", etc.

So it would go from being an employee database, to an ephemera database. The program doesn't really know the different between the two . . . as far as its concerned, it's all data, right?

I would like to see the other DB's mentioned here too before making any decision . . . so thanks for the feedback.

I don't think the database stuff is going to be all that much fun (at least compared to the actual collecting, sorting and viewing). I guess we already HAVE a database (in a sense) . . . the actual collection itself!!!!

[Nancy]

Try this for free----
http://www.java.com/en/download/openoffice.jsp?visitorID=5780647f-3...

[Valerie MacEwan]

Oh, good idea Frank. That makes sense. And Nancy - I have NeoOffice, duh. I am so out of practice with practical work, been blogging and writing fiction for too long. Completely forgot I had an office suite. Geesh.

It's really a shame iPhoto sucks. So much promise... so little delivered. It's inconvenient, at the very least. Since I've been through 3 Macs, I've imported my photos/scans each time and each time it's somehow screwed me up. Shoebox only takes 10,000 photos, I seem to recall and that just doesn't cut it for me. Grandsons's photos alone are almost that many! And then there are all the photos of spiders and creepy crawlies that I take for them... another thousand...

I think we can collaborate on a database, like using Frank's suggestion or something similar. Maybe we could even get grandiose in our plans and someday export our own files to one big db on here? We would rule! Of course, that ain't gonna' happen anytime soon, but we can dream, eh?

Meanwhile, can ya'll think of categories for all this stuff? I'm trying for some broad ones - to begin with - for paper ephemera
advertising
magazines
photos
personal correspondence
business correspondence
bills of lading/paid receipts
journals/diaries

???
The reason I'm so "into" this is that I'm in the midst of moving everything to another room in my house - so now is the time to organize... as if I really could. My art supplies/ephemera/computer/scanner etc is way way way too easily accessible by my grandsons age 2 and 4. Time to move it all upstairs... that really hit home when 2 year old came toward me with Exacto knife last week... and that was after he literally painted my living room couch.

oooops.

-v

[Gary Roberts]

Over in the archives world, we are using Filemaker as the DB, and Movable Type as a front end to feed into the DB. But then, this library has two pro FM programmers and another Oracle guy. All of which leaves the rest of us out.

The way I see it, we need a good DB that has some customizable features for the various collecting categories. But, and I say But, I bet that there are enough similarities between categories that a basic DB could work.

Friend of mine, who hosts my website, is an open source wizard of sorts. I'll run the idea by him. Sometimes I ask about something that I think is impossible, only to have Jim say 'sure, it's been done or I just have to fiddle something a bit'.

Back in Archives, we need to track paper, books, images, hard objects, video, etc etc and all from one DB. It's really a matter of creating a taxonomy that is flexible and not to huge or diverse and is tailored to the needs of the collection.