PIM's Part V - InfoSelect Part II by Dan Butler This article first appeared in TNPC #6.07

Last issue we took a quick look at InfoSelect 7. I told you how I use the program to store and retrieve thousands of bits of loose information. It saves me hours of time each week. How? By not breaking my train of thought every time I want to find something. This time we'll look at a few of the new features of version 7.

First let us look at the Internet data sharing. I skimmed over this last issue and told you it worked well for me. Currently I have no need to share data remotely. When I worked in an office I often used the net to transfer files back and forth between my home to office. This is a bit different as InfoSelect actually opens the file from the Internet and stores it back to the Internet without you having to use a separate FTP program. It's really seemless. Where on the Internet would you put your data? Almost all Internet accounts have some web space available to them. Just make sure you save the file back to the net before you close the program! It would also be a *very* good idea to use the built in encryption for any file you are accessing over the net.

Next I tried the Export to HTML option. This is very close to the Internet data sharing except other people will not need InfoSelect to view your data. I like having the ability to generate HTML from the various programs I use. The HTML generated is fairly complex but it does a nice job. The resulting web pages are almost identical to what you see inside InfoSelect. An expandable selector column down the left with full notes on the right. Nice. Both notes and Databases exported without a hitch.

I had less success exporting the calendar. The resulting page is nicely laid out and looks very promising. The problem is it just didn't want to work. I kept getting "errors on page" messages. Tried different browsers, turned off my Internet security and it still wouldn't work. The calendar is the only export that didn't work for me.

Databases are not a new feature in InfoSelect but they often get overlooked. Setting them up and using them is a piece of cake. Even better when you search for data the databases are searched along with any loose notes or calendar items you may have. No need to switch around. Set up your contacts in an InfoSelect database and you'll have an easy way to make a little roster for display on the Internet.

Another new feature is called Selector Grids. These are difficult to describe if you aren't already familiar with InfoSelect. Basically these allow you to put data on a grid with associated notes. I can see where this would be helpful. Just be careful not to hit tab at the wrong time! This creates a new column on your grid and shifts the current data out of place. Once your Grid is setup you can add freeform notes below any item. A simple click shows or hides the extra data when you need it. You could set a little grid up with product prices for instance and add loose notes with descriptions as an example.

Many changes deal with how InfoSelect handles email. I have not tested any of the email handling. The search tools would be great in an email context but I'm very set in my email ways.

One nifty feature is the ability to search your web browsers cache of visited sites. At first I thought this feature wasn't working since it didn't show me the search results as I typed. But work it does. Type what you want then hit enter. You'll get a list of topics showing the URL's of pages found in the search. Choose the topic you want and InfoSelect displays the web page for you. Unfortunately InfoSelect only searches the Internet Explorer cache and doesn't recognize the cache from my Opera web browser.

So what do I think of all the new features? I think some of them are nifty. However - InfoSelect has been trying to be all things for some time now. Email, calendar, database, and lots of ways to sort and categorize your data. This isn't bad but it is easy to be overwhelmed by it all and lose site of what the program does best - store and rapidly retrieve loose data. If it did nothing else the program would have a permanent spot on my PC. It saves me so much time. You'll find InfoSelect here:

http://www.miclog.com

Did you miss earlier installments in this series? You can find them here:

http://www.TheNakedPC.com/dan/

(c) 2003 Dan Butler
You can reach Dan Butler at:
danbutler@TheNakedPC.com