"The database I just sent to Sharon is basically a tool for turning data into reports."
That sums it up beautifully. In fact, I think it is a very elegant description of what a database is for: a tool for turning data into reports.
I've found that with a small to medium con, a spreadsheet works just fine up until the last 3-4 weeks, at which point it becomes hopelessly inadequate. That's because for most of the con-running year the only report you need to generate is the list of prospective programming items, sorted and filtered in various ways. Suddenly in the last month before the con you have an urgent need to generate reports that retrieve data in a different order than it was input: programming items by participant, by timeslot, and by room, each formatted in a very specific way.
Suddenly you descend into 60-hour weeks of frantic copying and pasting, cursing the lack of a database.
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branchandroot
no subject
Date: 2012-01-09 08:48 pm (UTC)That sums it up beautifully. In fact, I think it is a very elegant description of what a database is for: a tool for turning data into reports.
I've found that with a small to medium con, a spreadsheet works just fine up until the last 3-4 weeks, at which point it becomes hopelessly inadequate. That's because for most of the con-running year the only report you need to generate is the list of prospective programming items, sorted and filtered in various ways. Suddenly in the last month before the con you have an urgent need to generate reports that retrieve data in a different order than it was input: programming items by participant, by timeslot, and by room, each formatted in a very specific way.
Suddenly you descend into 60-hour weeks of frantic copying and pasting, cursing the lack of a database.