Carl Tyler's Blog :: Excel to Notes database in under two minutes

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Excel to Notes database in under two minutes

Category Excel Notes Approach

Stephan Wissel asked if there was a tool that could convert a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet into a Lotus Notes database. I'm glad to say I know of one, and created this movie to show how a spreadsheet can be used to create a Notes Database in under two minutes (I went slower for the video).

Excel to Lotus Notes Database in under two minutes. from Carl Tyler on Vimeo.
If you want the native AVI file, you can get it here http://www.vimeo.com/download/video:84325437?e=1214495086&h=f396326c9c8eae48d6dd6401dd873223

Lots of Gold in those old Lotus products, I hope the Chinese Symphony developers spend some time mining some of it.

Posted by Carl Tyler On 06/26/2008 | Permalink |

Comments

1 - Love Approach, it could do almost anything.

Posted by Keith Brooks At 10:59:09 AM On 06/26/2008 | - Website - |

2 - I haven't watched the video but I know where you're going with this having seen Approach create Notes forms 10+ years ago.

Stephan and I have talked about this too and some other folks have seen my specification for doing this via DXL within the SuperNTF framework. The nice part about that approach is that I can make the end form look nice out of the gate by slotting the new fields into a "standard" SuperNTF form. Putting labels and fields inside a basic table structure shouldn't be that hard either.

Posted by Kevin Pettitt At 11:32:08 AM On 06/26/2008 | - Website - |

3 - Great stuff! For years I've been suggesting that IBM should bundle Approach or a subset (aka Notes Reporter) with Notes. The reporting tool works much better than Crystal/Business Objects Reports with Notes data. Every Notes developer should grab a copy of Smartsuite for their toolbox before it gets discontinued.

Posted by Ed Maloney At 09:28:44 PM On 06/26/2008 | - Website - |