ETL and Data Integration tools - Modern ETL software for everyone

After being featured at Robert's shellcity.net site on March 9th; I downloaded a copy and was very impressed.

As a classic ASP/VBScript web developer, I've found the portable Database Browser extremely useful for quick looks at raw data in msSQL/Access databases, and Excel spreadsheets (used as data sources for my web pages) from machines which do not have Microsoft's SQL Server Management Studio, Access, or even Excel installed.

Working with databases which contain 100's of tables, I particularly like the ability to filter the tables list.

Since the data display for msSQL tables is limited to the TOP number specified in the toolbar, browsing through tables by simply pressing the is just too easy.

The ability to sort and filter returned data without resorting to changing an SQL statement is also a big plus.

It's also great for working with the CTP SQL databases created by Microsoft's Express (cheap) versions of Visual Studio.

Despite the lukewarm reception your posts received at PortableApps.com and JT Haller's insistence on Open Source; I'm a fan!


In order to really leverage the Database Browser's portability, the use of connection strings for Server/DSN discussed in the thread begun many months ago by Richard Nichols,(www.dbsoftlab.com/The-Suggestion-Box/444...along-with-DSNs.html) seemed like a god-send.

It works OK for connections; but in the Database Browser, after successfully displaying the data source's tables, attempts to browse the table's contents (eg clicking on the table name) fail with ...
** [Microsoft][ODBC Driver Manager] Data source name not found and no default driver specified.

So, unless I'm just doing something silly, I'd suggest this limitation be removed.

Although the GUI is pretty much intuitive; features like entering a connection string in the Server input field (and perhaps other features I haven't looked for yet) might warrant a bit of documentation in .chm file.


BTW: When thinking about Richard Nichol's suggestion to read connection strings from *text files* you might also want to consider supporting text files with a .dsn extention.

And FWIW: Personally I'd like a way to organize my connections list without deleting and re-adding entries. Perhaps by displaying a sorted list or the ability to cut'n'paste?

Please download the latest version

You should be able to use odbc connections strings now.

Support for views was also added.

No plans for help file at the moment unless you know the volunteers willing to do it.

Too busy writing Unicode version of Advanced ETL processor

Mike

Thanks for the quick response.

The new portable version 2.4.2.0 dated, on my system, 17-Mar-2009 06:45 seems to work just as I'd hoped. Again, many thanks


BTW: While waiting for those help file volunteers to starting queuing up: the link from both versions of the Browser's Help -> Home page point to www.dbsoftlab.com/index.php/Freeware/Data-Browser.html might be better redirected to www.dbsoftlab.com/Freeware/Database-Browser.html.