Amanda K. Waite,Web News Editor, University Communications asked:
University Communications is looking into the possibility of using data generated by Digital Measures (the new faculty reporting tool being implemented on campus) to update the experts database. We need a spreadsheet of netids, names and biography fields from the database to explore the possibility a bit more. I have access to an old expertds.dbf file, but I don’t think I can get into the current database. Would you be able to export and send me the current database in an Excel spreadsheet (or a tab or comma-delineated .txt file I can import into Excel)?
Not as easy as it sounds. First, I had to find the database, created years ago by a former web team intern. Then, I had a fight between mySQL and Excel. Several fights: treatment of carriage returns/line-feeds in database fields, and treatment of commas and quotes. Eventually, Excel conceded defeat before my powerful kung-fu dragon style.
