Spreadsheets are wonderfully useful things, especially for tasks involving calculations. But even Excel can be pushed to it's limit if it's not the right tool for the job.
That's easy for me to say. I know Microsoft Access much better than I know Excel. But trust me when I tell you that for many library-related tasks, databases are the only way to go. If you'd like to get started using databases take a look at "Spreadsheet Does Not = Database" in the Feb. 3, 2004 issue of PC Magazine.
According to the article, there are several significant advantages to using databases:
- Databases write data to the hard drive immediately, so there is less likelihood of losing data.
- Databases can handle more data
- Databases can easily link tables of related data together.
They left out an important point. Databases make it relatively easy to create flexible, attractive reports that show data and subsets of data in a variety of ways. For example, if you have an invoices database, you can create reports showing all invoices by title, by date, showing 2 fields, showing all fields, sorting by a combination of fields, show only invoices dated last month, the possibilities are endless.
There are many other advantages. For example, using Microsoft Access you can build easy to use data-entry forms and validate the text entered into the database.
Though new features have made spreadsheets even more flexible, for certain applications, a spreadsheet is no substitute for a good database.
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