Обсуждение: Relational DB's & pics - a long business-related question
Thank you in advance to anyone willing to give his/her opinion on this... My Questions: Is Postgres an ideal program to use as the backbone of a website/program that links pictures with traditional database info? And, is there a frontend that would be easy to use to enter data by people who know nothing about SQL? I'm thinking something with an MS Access-like interface. Background: Over the past several months I've been teaching myself SQL through Postgres, well, just because it seems like something good to know. So I'm familiar with the program and SQL, but I'm far from an expert. I recently started a new job and I mentioned how much more efficient sales would go if items, prices, etc., were organized into a database rather than (non-uniform) spreadsheets. I was comfortable & eager to do this - I figured the experience would benefit me and my company. While bringing this up, my head boss agreed with me and spoke of his interest in a database that also included pictures of our items (I'm guessing a few thousand items), so that anyone in the company, whether they be in sales or operations, be able to track an item down visually and get specifics on the particular item. His idea was something that looked like ebay (i.e., picture on the left, relevant info on the right), but included relevant company info rather than price/auction info. Obviously, I'm not qualified to fully develop this project, but I know it'll go no where unless I push it. So I'm wondering, what are the pieces that need to be put together to get it this to work? I assume this would involve developing an (internal) website that accesses a database of information and pictures. Would Postgresql be an ideal program for this? MS Access is ideal for data entry by people who are familiar with spreadsheets, but have no knowledge of SQL. Is there an extension or software related to Postgres that is ideal for data entry for people used to visual/mouse-based computing? Any suggestions are welcome. Thank you. Eric
Not that I ever felt the urge to do this yet, but it has been done before :} http://po.shaftnet.org/doku.php http://linpha.sourceforge.net/wiki/index.php/Main_Page http://tof.bearteam.org/index.en.html Cheers, Andrej
On Jul 14, 2006, at 1:35 AM, Eric Matthew Finnin wrote: > So I'm wondering, what are the pieces that need to be put together to > get it this to work? I assume this would involve developing an > (internal) website that accesses a database of information and > pictures. Would Postgresql be an ideal program for this? MS Access > is ideal for data entry by people who are familiar with spreadsheets, > but have no knowledge of SQL. Is there an extension or software > related to Postgres that is ideal for data entry for people used to > visual/mouse-based computing? Any suggestions are welcome. I would suggest looking into existing web-based e-commerce solutions. Plenty are open source and I'm sure have a "inventory management" view for specifying product attributes and and pictures. For example, Drupal has an e-commerce module: http://drupal.org/project/ecommerce Also opentaps (http://www.opentaps.org/) has a product management module which I pretty sure supports pictures. Check out the online demo. Both solutions are open source and support PostgreSQL. John DeSoi, Ph.D. http://pgedit.com/ Power Tools for PostgreSQL
Eric, We've been working on something for almost 2 years that may fit your needs and is now in the late stages of alpha testing. I'm unsure of the "Rules" for this list and would not like to be accused of Spamming as our work will eventually be a commercial product (though very affordable). Also, we're not ready for public exposure so adding a link here would be inappropriate, regardless of list rules. I guess, if you have interest in taking a look, contact me directly? Eric Matthew Finnin wrote: > Thank you in advance to anyone willing to give his/her opinion on this... > > My Questions: Is Postgres an ideal program to use as the backbone of a > website/program that links pictures with traditional database info? > And, is there a frontend that would be easy to use to enter data by > people who know nothing about SQL? I'm thinking something with an MS > Access-like interface. > > Background: Over the past several months I've been teaching myself > SQL through Postgres, well, just because it seems like something good > to know. So I'm familiar with the program and SQL, but I'm far from > an expert. I recently started a new job and I mentioned how much more > efficient sales would go if items, prices, etc., were organized into a > database rather than (non-uniform) spreadsheets. I was comfortable & > eager to do this - I figured the experience would benefit me and my > company. While bringing this up, my head boss agreed with me and > spoke of his interest in a database that also included pictures of our > items (I'm guessing a few thousand items), so that anyone in the > company, whether they be in sales or operations, be able to track an > item down visually and get specifics on the particular item. His idea > was something that looked like ebay (i.e., picture on the left, > relevant info on the right), but included relevant company info rather > than price/auction info. Obviously, I'm not qualified to fully > develop this project, but I know it'll go no where unless I push it. > > So I'm wondering, what are the pieces that need to be put together to > get it this to work? I assume this would involve developing an > (internal) website that accesses a database of information and > pictures. Would Postgresql be an ideal program for this? MS Access > is ideal for data entry by people who are familiar with spreadsheets, > but have no knowledge of SQL. Is there an extension or software > related to Postgres that is ideal for data entry for people used to > visual/mouse-based computing? Any suggestions are welcome. > > Thank you. > > Eric > > ---------------------------(end of broadcast)--------------------------- > TIP 3: Have you checked our extensive FAQ? > > http://www.postgresql.org/docs/faq >