AskSam Systems' askSam 3.0 Professional

Emedia Professional, June, 1998 by Mark Fritz

Webmasters seeking even greater power and flexibility in their Web databases can license the askSam Engine Software Developers Kit. Buying the kit gives programmers access to the tool's APIs for customization purposes. The Westinghouse Owners Group (nuclear power plants using Westinghouse equipment) used the Engine SDK on its Web site. Over 2,500 Nuclear Regulatory Commission documents were placed into a central askSam database. And using Microsoft's Active Server Pages technology (which lets you include Visual Basic commands in your Web pages), the group's Webmaster created search screens that access and display the information. Hits in documents are highlighted and you can jump from one hit to the next.

CAN YOU ASKSAM TOO MUCH?

While askSam may do things that will astound you, don't expect miracles from it, either as an information overload solution or as a database alternative. While its flexibility makes data entry easier than with traditional databases, entering the data is only half the battle. The real trick of using a database program is learning how to get useful information out of what you've entered. That means learning how to search, sort, and structure reports--the same kind of things you have to learn if you were using any database product. And askSam is not easy to learn and get used to. When you're trying to learn askSam, its major strength--its freeformness--also becomes its greatest liability.

Nevertheless, askSam does have some clear advantages over traditional databases and its freeform nature may suit your personality. It also appears to have great potential for use with Web sites. While askSam may not become your savior, it may become a good helpmate.

RELATED ARTICLE: askSam 3.0 Professional

Synopsis: With askSam, you can create a database for CD-ROM, diskette, or Web distribution with as strict or loose a structure as you wish, and if you come upon a document that can't be broken down in fields, you just throw it in with the other fielded documents anyway. You may not be able to access the data in those freeform documents as easily or take advantage of reporting, but you can at least employ full-text searching. And your documents will no longer float in limbo on your hard disk, where, unorganized and unindexed, they are as good as lost.

Price: askSam Professional $395; askSam 3.0: $149.95 (no full-text indexing)

System Requirements: 486 or faster PC running Windows 3.1/95/NT; 4MB RAM; 4-7MB free hard drive space

For more information, contact: askSam Systems 121 South Jefferson Street, Perry, FL 32347; 850/584-6590; Fax 850/584-7481; http://www.asksam.com; InfoLink #406

RELATED ARTICLE: WHO USES ASKSAM?

Doctors, such as family physician Jim Vause of Blenheim, New Zealand, use askSam. Dr. Vause and the other three doctors in his medical group use the network version of askSam to manage patient medical notes, prescription generation, billing, and recall of "various odd bits of information."

Bob Zabor, Website Manager for Leader Institute, a personnel recruitment firm in Atlanta, Georgia, used askSam to create a resume database. Although intended primarily for recruiters, the site also allows job seekers to fill out forms to submit as resumes. "Since starting our Web site in 1996, we've been struggling a lot with how to make information in our databases available to our clients," says Zabor. "A small CGI flat-file database would have been too slow and limiting, and other database solutions were too big, too expensive, and too difficult to implement for what we needed. So askSam is basically a good fit for us."