I posted this on the newsgroup, and it was suggested that I might get more informed discussion by posting it here.
HERE'S THE ORIGINAL ISSUE I PRESENTED... I've been trying to find a good way to keep track of research notes. Like the amount one would generate over the course of a year or two of extensive research. I need a freeform database that allows fast, easy entry and access, and will accommodate a variety of sources without having to pre-define fields. After experimenting with Entourage X Notes for a few days, I started wondering if I'm exceeding what Notes was (were?) designed for. - How big can notes safely be? Entourage Help talks about notes as if they're merely electronic Posti-Its. Yet there are tools to insert graphics and format text like one would want to do with actual documents. I'm finding articles on the web I want to save. Some are a couple of pages of text. A few are over 15 pages. One was 80 pages! [Diana Ross was kind enough to check with someone at Microsoft and says there's no limit on note size.] - Will extensive notes make other Entourage functions run slow, like email and calendar? [Diana's information was that tons o' Notes won't slow down email and Calendar.] - Is there any practical limit to the number and complexity of links between notes? I'm trying to compensate for the lack of sub-categories in Entourage by first creating "sub-category notes" that contain nothing but a subject line, and then linking actual content notes to the those. If I ever had to do an advanced rebuild of the database, all these links would be destroyed. Is it foolhardy to make extensive use of links with critical data? Or would that be true with any other application as well? So, bottom line... Am I doing something that Entourage is not really designed to do, and will I regret having placed valuable research data in Notes? HERE'S AN UPDATE... I bit the bullet and called Microsoft tech support. Actually found them to be very professional, pleasant, good hand-holding. Insanely Great Apple tech support could take a lesson or two. Anyway... The guy was really quite forthcoming. I asked him would he entrust _his_ data, acquired over a 1-2 year research project to Entourage, and he said, "No. I wouldn't." He said Entourage works great as an email and calendar program, but they cannot recommend it for serious database use where critical data would be stored. The database is simply not stable enough for that. I was amazed at the admission, but thankful for his candor. Apparently database damage most often results from receiving damaged emails. That damages the database, and requires an advanced rebuild, which can destroy data in some cases, and destroys links in every case. I was planning on relying on links extensively. I asked the tech if I could run a second legal copy of Entourage that I used only for notes (thus avoiding corruption due to damaged emails). He went offline to ask other folks there. When he came back on, the answer was the same. What I want to do is not recommended. I'm pleased at the straight talk, but disappointed that Entourage isn't going to do the job for me. There are few funky features, but also some nice ones not available elsewhere. Usually the problem in the software industry is that companies overstate what their application can really do. I figure that if Microsoft is saying don't do it... I shouldn't do it. So, the question for this group is, does anyone have more in-depth knowledge of Entourage X that would differ from tech support's assessment? Seems to me that the Mac community is underserved in terms of rock solid, real professional quality free-form databases whose data entry field/window accepts all kinds of media -- text, pictures, movies, html, etc. -- that doesn't have to be predefined. Currently, I'm evaluating Chronos' StickyBrain, which offers something similar. Lacks the linking feature of Entourage. Not integrated into my calendar of course. But offers fast, convenient free-form data entry. Built to handle large blocks of text. It's looking promising. Chronos says they intend to fully develop the product in the future. Most importantly -- and this was a big concern about Entourage X -- you can export your data into a tab-delimited text file for import into other applications. And the StickyBrain data file itself, while having proprietary code embedded in it, can be read by a text editor, and it seems that if anything went South, one could retrieve their data manually. Thanks in advance for your thoughts... Doug ------------------------ Doug Brightwell [EMAIL PROTECTED] ------------------------ -- To unsubscribe: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> archives: <http://www.mail-archive.com/entourage-talk%40lists.letterrip.com/> old-archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/entourage-talk%40lists.boingo.com/>
