SYMPHYTUM

Nick Peers reveals how to create your own simple databases in minutes with no coding or server experience required. It’s open source magic!

Nick Peers

OUR EXPERT

Nick Peers built his first database for his computer science GCSE back in the mists of 1988.

Master Symphytum’s Tables view

1 Database tools Use these buttons to create, duplicate or delete a collection, as well as lock your database form and set up cloud sync.

2 Collections Individual databases are stored as a separate collection, but all your collections reside in a single .db file.

3 Field/Record controls Use these buttons to populate your database with new (or duplicated) fields and records. Also delete unwanted items.

4 Choose your view Symphytum provides just two straightforward views. Choose either Form for entering data and viewing single records, or Table for a wider overview.

5 Edit records You can edit individual records in Table view as well as Form view - just double-click a field to do so.

6 Search Quickly filter the records shown in Table view by typing a keyword into the Search box.

These days, databases are more routinely associated with powering websites and ecommerce systems. To the casual user they look impenetrable, involving connecting to third-party database servers such as SQL and hiding behind opaque languages like PHP. But at their heart, databases are simple tables of information: each row represents a single record, and its specific characteristics - such as name, colour, or whether it’s currently in your possession or not - are recorded in columns known as fields.

If your needs are modest, then you don’t need to learn any programming languages or tackle complex database software to put together a collection of information you can later search in various ways to find what you need from it. Indeed, many people build such simple databases using spreadsheet software, but even here there’s a whole new interface to learn and tools to find. There are only so many hours in the day.

Luckily, there’s a whole host of simple, user-friendly tools that wrap up simple databases in software anyone can set up and use within minutes. Many are geared towards specific tasks, such as cataloguing a collection of plants, but there’s one tool that offers all the features you’d expect of a simple database in a user-friendly format: Symphytum.

Symphytum is a throwback to the days when databases were simple to construct. Start by designing your database. First, define the fields that make up each record. Assign each field a data type, such as text, numbers, date, image, check box or drop-down menu, then design a form into which you enter the details of each record. The form also serves as a viewing tool for individual records, while a secondary table view provides you with an overview of your entire database, with the means to sort and filter the view using a simple keyword-based search tool.