Actually, The Field Museum Anthropology Department (over 300,000 individual
records representing approximately 1.5 million objects) is happily using
FileMaker Pro (even less "bells and whistles" than Access).  I cannot echo
Steve strongly enough: it isn't just what your software CAN do, it's what
you really are going to use it to do.


Janice Klein
Registrar, The Field Museum
[log in to unmask]


At 02:11 PM 7/1/1998 -0700, you wrote:
>Patricia McElyea (Curator of Collections from Arkansas State University
>Museum) wrote:
>
>>Early this year we switched from Argus to the new Past Perfect software
that is distributed by AASLH.  We have been delighted not only with its
features but also with its ease of use...
>
>While a constant "lurker" on this list I rarely post, but in this case:
>(OK..., long run on sentence here):  At the time of the ARGUS
>installation, I was the person who supervised the technical support end
>of this equation for the vendor involved and from "my" point of view
>Arkansas State University Museum greatly "over-bought" for their needs
>(were "over-sold" is a question of semantics I don't want to get into
>here).
>
>"Needs" go well beyond the number of objects which must be entered into
>the database or the speed of retrieval.  Staffing time and in-house
>expertise (or just plain computer literacy) must certainly be
>considered.  A system which may be nearly infinately configurable
>requires large amounts staffing time to implement.  "Bells and whistles"
>may be COOL, but will they be used and does the staff have time to use
>them.
>
>A few weeks back Janice Klein from the Field Museum said that they were
>using ACCESS (I think?) quite happily.  We're not even close to a
>plateau in the development curve of software/hardware innovation.
>Beyond serving current needs, probably the most important question that
>an institution needs to consider is the ease of convertablity of the
>data stored to the "next" system.
>
>Steve Erdmann
>(formerly Vice President and General Manager for Questor Systems, Inc.)
>
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