Bournemouth — Nov 17th 2009

A much better turn-out this month, almost up to the good attendances of the summer. Don Collier, of Semaphore Communications in Poole came along to give us a clear, intersting and inspirational (sufficient to get us all downloading trial copies of the program) presentation on Bento3. A modern take on a database from Apple, while not having some of the functionality of some people's sturdy favourite, Bento is nontheless very useful in many areas, being firmly connected to the other Mac applications of Address Book, iCal and iPhoto. The databases of these applications are seen by Bento as libraries which can then be utilised in a wide variety of contexts. Don demonstrated the ease and amazing rapidity with which very large files - using a big Excel spreadsheet as an example - can be imported into Bento, how photos in iPhoto can be catalogued as to subject matter, EXIF information and many other parameters.
As a Filemaker professional Don showed also the areas where Filemaker would perhaps be preferable to Bento, though of course the cost difference is enough to make one think twice. The upshot of this very enjoyable and illuminating evening is that most of us are about to download a trial copy of Bento 3 to see how we like it. Even one of those people who have long expressed their loyalty to old favourites!

Comments

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John Surtees said…

A very interesting meeting. A fascinating insight into a very useful little program. Our CD/DVD/LP collection, may finally get catalogued.

On a more disappointing note. Did anybody else get clobbered for the parking fee in the car park? After a couple of years of finding the barrier up after 8.00pm, we got over there at gone 9.00 and the barrier was still down. It cost a fiver to get out. Judging by the amount of people hanging around looking confused, we were not the only ones to be caught out.

Michael Corgan said…

Well, the slow service in the Italian restaurant came to our rescue... We are sorry that people got caught by the late raising of the barrier, and will try to find out what time it will take place in the future and keep people informed accordingly.
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