On Tuesday 02 March 2010 02:53:14 pm Timothy Murphy wrote:
I'd really like to have a "database" for storing
information about contacts (as in an address book).
My base is Fedora/KDE.
Yes, I would love such a thing too. Do you have one? :-)
Seriously speaking, it could be used not only for contacts, but in general.
My requirements are:
1. The application should be web-based,
like CUPS, BackupPC, etc.
This is crucial. If I could access the database over a web interface, that
would be quite sufficient. Actually, what you want is basically a good and
functional web-oriented GUI frontend for, say, mysql backend...
2. There should be a simple interface with mobile phones.
What do you mean by this? When you are accessing the database remotely (via
the web interface), how do you plan to connect to a mobile phone?
3. There should be a simple interface with KMail/KAddressBook.
This should be something like "import contacts from the web" kind of option in
KAddressBook. It's probably doable. Or, there could be an "export into
kaddressbook-type file" button in the web interface, which is probably even
easier to implement. Or a comma-separated-values file, which virtually any
addressbook app can import.
4. The program should be sufficiently flexible
to allow new fields (eg images) to be added.
This is also crucial. I could really make use of a database with dynamic field
configurations in tables. Or a sufficiently powerful web-interface which would
instruct mysql backend to do all the hard work.
5. The program should allow general information
eg about films or books to be stored.
Even better, I would wish to be able to store an arbitrary file into a database
field. Or have the field contain a symlink to the file. So I don't want to have
_information_ about films and books in the database, but rather the actual films
and books themselves.
6. I'd like the program to interface with Windows Outlook
and similar Windows programs.
Well, I don't need this one. And web-like access to data is platform-
independent, so at least that part could work everywhere.
Currently OpenLDAP is the nearest I can get to this,
but I find it very cumbersome,
and there seems no simple GUI interface.
Well, as I said above, the *only* thing that is actually needed is a powerful
web GUI, for *any* database backend. Mysql, postgresql, openldap, a plain text
file, whatever does the work.
As far as I can see, Nepomuk aims vaguely
at something like this,
but it seems too far from practical use to be of much value.
I'm wondering if anyone has found a solution to this,
or indeed whether anyone shares my desire?
Oh, if you ever find such a thing, do send me an e-mail with a link! It would
make my life sooo much easier... :-)
BTW, I would add the following requirements:
7. It should be able to handle multiple databases. I might have one for
contacts, one for books, one for music, one for... , all in the same GUI. Or
to be able to connect the GUI to this or that one dynamically.
8. It should be GPL, of course, and included in Fedora! :-)
Best, :-)
Marko