Talk:DBase

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Contents

[edit] Praise for dBase

Dbase is a excellent program I am still using it today. It is so easy and so powerfull. I do hope its life will goes on.

david

[edit] Unix

Was there every a Unix version?

Never mind, appears there was. If anyone know which Unixes it was ported to, that might help.

8/2/06 dBase 2.6 is a great tool. Try it you'll like it.

[edit] dBASE is a trademark

"dBASE" is the correct name of this product.

Although there are several popular ways to capitalize the dBASE name, the trademark listed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office is lowercase "d", uppercase "BASE". The dBASE trademarks listed are filed under Serial Number 73465470, Registration Number 1325541 and Serial Number 73715289, Registration Number 1538129 with the United States Patent and Trademark Office

Further, the WP:MOSTM very clearly says:

Trademarks in CamelCase are a judgement call. CamelCase may be used where it reflects general usage and makes the trademark more readable.

dBase is no more readable than dBASE. As such, this article should properly be retitled and the name references corrected.

Mike 06:04, 22 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] dBASE vs Clipper

The very first paragraph reads: "(dBASE) lost market share to competitors such as Paradox, Clipper, FoxPro, and Microsoft Access". Clipper entry states that it's a language (or compiler) used by dBASE. So how could they be competitors? (I have not used any of them and not 100 % sure so I don't want to change it myself) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 62.168.125.217 (talk) 19:55, 24 February 2007 (UTC).

Clipper is a compiler for dBase with many extensions. As a compiled language, programs run faster in Clipper than in dBase and over time many applications that started as dBase applications were switched to Clipper and did not require dBase to run. However, Clipper would never have existed without dBase - the basic language was the same.Manassehkatz 05:21, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Clipper was a separate product produced by a small company formed by some former Ashton-Tate employees. It was a competitor in all respects. The speed differences between a compiled program and an interpreter can be great. Due to various reasons Ashton-Tate elected not to start development on a dBASE compiler until the late 80s shortly before the company was purchased by Borland. Kmund 13:21, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] dBASE 'standard' file format no longer standard

The article seems to imply that the .DBF file format is standard across all applications and dialects. Perhaps there should be mention of dBASE II, dBASE III, dBASE IV, Clipper, Codebase and other dialects and products that no longer conform to a single file standard. Will Nitschke 02:37, 1 June 2007 (UTC)