Linux Format

Databases made quick and easy

These days, databases are more routinely associated with powering websites and ecommerce systems. To the casual user they look impenetrable, involving connecting to third-party database servers such as SQL and hiding behind opaque languages like PHP. But at their heart, databases are simple tables of information: each row represents a single record, and its specific characteristics – such as name, colour, or whether it’s currently in your possession or not – are recorded in columns known as fields.

If your needs are modest, then you don’t need to learn any programming languages or tackle complex database software to put together a collection of information you can later search in various ways to find what you need from it. Indeed, many people build such simple databases using spreadsheet software, but even here there’s a whole new interface to learn and tools to find. There are only so many hours in the day.

Luckily, there’s a whole host of simple, user-friendly tools that wrap up simple databases in software anyone can set up and use within minutes. Many are geared towards specific tasks, such as cataloguing a.

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from Linux Format

Linux Format14 min read
Ubuntu at 20
Without Ubuntu, the current Linux landscape would be unrecognisable. Back in October 2004, the first 4.10 (2004.10) release of Ubuntu, with its intriguing Warty Warthog code name, leapt from obscurity to being one of the most downloaded Linux distrib
Linux Format2 min read
Make Way For Nobility
It’s that most special time of the year when Canonical releases a new Ubuntu LTS. This I time, the creature it has loosed unto the world is Noble Numbat. And what a fine specimen it is. OK, full disclosure before we get stuck in: we’re basing our eva
Linux Format10 min read
Answers
I was originally using the Cinnamon version of Linux Mint 21.3. I heard good things about MATE, so I did a new installation to try out MATE. After several months, I decided that I would like to go back to Cinnamon. I am not sure how to switch back wi

Related Books & Audiobooks