Hi, I would like to thank Ed and Paul for their responses and updates. I just downloaded the latest tarball and everything works perfectly (though I must admit still having difficulty with ReportDesigner).
As my background is web-apps, I have very little experience with desktop applications. Part of my current project is collating operating data from 3 vessels and two countries- this feeds into a web-app I created using Zope and MySQL. This project is live and has been running for two months now. To collect the data onboard (since they don't have net access in the middle of the ocean;), I started with a simple excel spreadsheet. However, this soon reached it's limitations, and the next obvious step was to create a desktop app that mimicked some of the features of the web-app (entry, edit, search, and reporting of fairly complex SQL). I started wondering how to do this and ofcourse turned to Python. I discovered wxPython which seemed to handle what I wanted fairly well in terms of creating a visual app. The next step was the database. I came across Firebird, which is perfect because of it's embedded feature. The next step was to link the two. I found SQLObject, but that had limitations in the primary key (which I need to be specific about to allow replication of several databases). Then I came across Dabo. Dabo seems perfect. The SimpleApps showed exactly what I need in terms of entry, edit, and search. Also, ReportDesigner will allow me to create the reports I need (once I can figure out how to use it:). However, I'm having a little difficulty determining whether Dabo is sufficiently developed for someone like myself. I have a feeling that I might be a few years too early. One of the main reasons for this is the documentation. I understand that it is the last part of the agenda, but I am lost without it. If someone can point me in the right direction, perhaps I can get a better grip on this. Using the OneToManyApp as an example: 1. Instead of opening a new app for every table (which would confuse my users no end), I have been trying to open each table as a separate tab (much like FieldSpecEditor). Each tab would be identical to the current forms. In this way there is only one window, and if a user wanted to do other things (such as a report), they would just open another tab. I haven't had any success with this. How can this be done? 2. I need to customise the search page to search on foreign keys with drop down menus. The options in FieldSpecEditor seem limited. How can I add custom fields to configure the search form (and also the entry form) to a greater degree? 3. Many of the reports I will need to produce involve joins from several tables. For example, a report of each orditem with the total number of orders. Where would such code go? I really would like to use Dabo. The benefits to Dabo would be an international (non-IT) company using Dabo as it's primary recording system. I'm sure that would make for good press. Thank you in advance, Matthew Fairclough. --- StripMime Report -- processed MIME parts --- multipart/alternative text/plain (text body -- kept) text/html --- _______________________________________________ Post Messages to: [email protected] Subscription Maintenance: http://leafe.com/mailman/listinfo/dabo-users
