 |
|
People | |
Ratings | |
Events | |
Places | |
Forums |  |
Shop | |
Magazine | ||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 |
||||||||||||
|
 RateBeer Weekly Magazine > Craft Beer IntroductionYour RB database on Palm Pilot
A SHORT GUIDE TO MOBILE BEER MANAGEMENT
January 8, 2004
I took my ratings from the site and imported them into my Palm Pilot. It now also acts as a rating tool, because all the fields are already there. I posted this to the Forums a while ago and updated it since based on some questions and clarified my instructions after doing it again. It is useful in stores, beer festivals and bragging to friends when you can't remember all the beers that you have drank. <P>This article only describes how I got my ratings into my Palm Pilot using a Windows PC. Using any other PDA or computer will have different steps, but the idea is the same. I'm not responsible for any damage you do to your equipment and I'm assuming that you know how to use your Palm Pilot, Windows PC and can deal with a basic database program on the Palm. If these instructions are not good enough for you, please ask someone you know who understands computers. <P>For the database program on the Palm, download Jfile: <a hrefhttp://www.land-j.com/jfile.html target=window>http://www.land-j.com/jfile.html by clicking the Try It! Button on that page. The trial version of Jfile only allows one database, but that's all we need. <P>Unzip your Jfile download and install the Jfile.prc on your Palm and put the jconv5.exe on a Windows PC. <P>Go to RateBeer.com and (if you are a Premium member) click on the link called Compile My Ratings on the My Account | My Messages page. Choose By Beer Name and Delimited ASCII (|) and download this text file to your computer. <P>Open up this file in your favorite word processor. Make sure that each beer only has one carriage return and that it is after the Comments! Remove any carriage returns that you have in the Comments field, as that is the marker for a new record. Microsoft Notepad is an easy way to see this if you turn off Word Wrapping in the Format menu. <P>(Please note that this paragraph is very specific to the database program that I'm using) Then we need to replace the |'s (hold shift hit \) in the file with ;'s. However, we first need to get rid of any ;'s in the Comments. Using the Find/Replace feature of your word processor change all the ; to , (semicolons to commas). Now search for | and replace with a ; with no spaces. Note: Microsoft Notepad does this really slow, while Microsoft WordPad, does this very fast. <P>Remove the word "DONE." at the end. <P>Now you should have a semicolon delimited file with carriage returns only after each beer's comments. <P>Save this file with any name and a .csv extension. Let's call it RateBeer.csv. <P>Now run the Jconv5.exe program on your PC. Check Semicolon instead of Comma in Field Delimiter. Select Convert Jfile 5.x .CSV to .PDB. Give it the name of the .csv file you created (RateBeer.csv) and the name of the .Pdb file you want to call it. Why not pick RateBeer.PDB? <P>When I first tried this it failed because I have a beer with 20" in the name and it complained about an unclosed quotemark. Databases are like that. Anyway, it will tell you what line of the RateBeer.csv file is the problem if there is one. <P>Now load the .pdb file to the Palm, by double-clicking on it and HotSyching. <P>Run the Jfile program you previously installed on the Palm and you'll see the RateBeer database. Just tap on it. <P>I hid some columns and resized others (just tap on the column names) so that it displays the beer name across most of the screen and the Total Score on the right. <P>From Jfile's main screen, I used the Modify button to add two more fields to the database. A Cellar field and Update field (only a checkbox) right under the Total Score. <P>The Cellar field is used to show how many bottles I have stored away, and the Update checkbox lets me know if I need to enter anything from this record to back to RateBeer. Just check it every time you add or modify a rating on the Palm and uncheck it after you add it to the web site. <P>Rating new beers is as easy as tapping Add. It creates a new record and then you can enter whatever information about a new beer that you would like. Hopefully you have a keypad/board if you are writting long comments! <P>You can get as crazy as you want by creating fields and entering information such as price, bottle size, type of glass, where you buy it, etc. <P>Have fun, Volgon ................................................................
Comments
................................................................
Anyone can submit an article to RateBeer. Send your edited, HTML formatted article to our Editor-In-Chief. |
 Related storiesOther Stories By Volgon Beer Hunting in the Bizarro WorldMar 31, 2004 Fear and Loathing in DenverJan 9, 2003 | ||||||||||
