Author: Dann Corbit
Date: 16:35:21 09/02/05
Go up one level in this thread
On September 02, 2005 at 13:29:11, Uri Blass wrote: >On September 01, 2005 at 22:00:52, David Mitchell wrote: > >>On September 01, 2005 at 19:57:26, Uri Blass wrote: >> >>>On September 01, 2005 at 16:50:38, David Mitchell wrote: >>> >>>Note that I am one of the members of the Israeli >>>chess rating committee(the committe is not only about rating but rating is one >>>of the subjects that they deal with it). >>>Members are all volunteers and we do not get money for it but it is important >>>for me to have a better rating system and it is clear that without a new >program it will not be easy to make changes in the rating system. >>> >>>I also have part of the data because GM Ram Sofer(the person who is resposible >>>for using the software that they have in the last months) sent me some access >>>files. >>> >>>Personally I know almost nothing about access so I simply translated the >columns to text files by copy and paste and wrote some program in C to >calculate statistics about the text files. >>> >>>I think that it is even better if the Israeli chess organization get rid of all >>>the access and simply save the results in text files and use some C program to >>>read text files and analyze them. >>> >> >>Trust me, Uri. You don't want to do that. You need a spreadsheet or a database >>program, or both. Too many benefits to list them all, but having different >>people work in diverse locations, with "some C program", is not what you want. >> >>Use Excel for a day, and you'll never want to go back to anything like this. You >>should be able to pick up an older (but perfectly good), version of Excel, by >>some company that has decided to upgrade to the latest version. >> >>Should be able to get it for very little money. >> >> >> >> >> >>>In that case if there is a mistake people only need to edit the text files. >> >>Oh yeah, there will be mistakes, count on it! >> >>> >>> >>>Note that I already have a program to analyze text files but the format of my >>>text file today is not good for editing because of the way that I copied the >>>data. >> >>There you go! No "homegrown" program will have half the features you will really >>want, or be half as easy to train others to use. >>> >>>I copied the data from the access file by copy and paste so I copied long >>>columns that is clearly easier than copying small lines that have only details >>>about a single game. >>> >> >>You should just use the Export data function. You can export your data in >>several formats, including ascii (text). > >Thanks for your advice > >Note that only now I am near a computer that can read the access files because >access is not installed in other computers but using the export data function is >very good idea. > >It is a different format but I get all the table as a text in few seconds >instead of getting it in few hours. > >If I understand correctly you say that using Excel is better than using access. >I did not know that it is so easy to translate access files to excel files. Export from Access. It will take you two minutes. I do not think Excel will be easier than Access. Leaving the data in MS Access will be better because you can apply rules to a database and you cannot apply rules to a spreadsheet. I have seen multi-million dollar disasters caused by using spreadsheets where a database should have been used. A spreadsheet is easier to use than a text editor but it is not safer. The functionality in a spreadsheet is better than most editors (except possibly Emacs) but it is not better than Access and both use that peculiar VB basic dialect anyway.
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