Author: Uri Blass
Date: 18:03:08 09/02/05
Go up one level in this thread
On September 02, 2005 at 19:35:21, Dann Corbit wrote: >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 already found it and translated the data both to text files and to excel files and sent the data to myself by gmail so I can read it from every computer. > >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. What was the problem? A spreadsheet is easier to use than a text >editor but it is not safer. What is unsafe in a text editor? Note that it is possible to save a backup of the data if there is a risk to lose information. I also think that it may be possible to do everything by C program that read text files and I think that it may be better solution than the situation today because it may be possible to change data simply by editing text files when I read that the situation today is that in case that there is a mistake people need to delete everything and enter the data again instead of simply fixing the mistakes. Uri
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