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Introduction
Guide To Using Product Source Goldmine Databases
By :Carl Galletti
The purpose of this guide is to give you some assistance with manipulating the databases that are sold by ProductSourceGoldmine.com or one of its licensees.
With this guide you have probably received one or more ".sql" files, also referred to later in this guide as "data files." These are the actual databases.
WHAT IS A DATABASE?
A database consists of a set of records. Each record has data in it. For example, a database of hotels would list a different hotel's information (the data) in each record.
So, a simple database of hotels with a super-simple structure might look like this:
Hotel Sedona, 928-555-1234
Grand Hotel,609-555-1234
ABC Hotel,212-555-0011
etc.
Each of the above lines is a RECORD and each record has two FIELDS. The first FIELD is the NAME of the hotel and the second field is the PHONE.
Each record contains the information (set of data) for that particular hotel and the fields contain the actual data elements which comprise that set of data.
The structure of a database refers to the general field names for each data element that compose each record. In the above example, that would be NAME and PHONE.
So, the STRUCTURE of the above database would be:
NAME
PHONE
In a very simplistic form.
Guide To Using Product Source Goldmine Databases
Each database you may have received with this document has a structure and that structure could be different for each database (some databases may have the same structure also).
To deal with a database there has to be a structure defined (like NAME, ADDRESS, PHONE, etc) and there has to be a group of data (like the 3 lines above) which defines what data is in each record. The structure must also contain more information like the type and length of data and some other info but we're just going to stick to a super simplistic explanation for the sake of clarity. You don't really need to deal with the slight complexities.
Basically, what you need to know is that the database(s) you received are in the form of a ".sql" file and that file contains both the structure and the data records for that database.
WHY ".sql" Files?
In order to facilitate transferability and usefulness, the database needs to be in this form. These ".sql" files were saved from a cpanel/MySql database running on a linux type server. This is for simplicity of use since most people run or can get access to this common type of server.
This guide will show you how to restore/upload the ".sql" file to a Cpanel/MySql based server where you can then download it as a CSV (Comma Separated Value) type file which can easily be read by Microsoft Excel, Open Office Calc (OpenOffice.org) or any one of many other software programs that will easily handle this format. Once in Excel/Calc you can then save it as an HTML or DOC file and from there even a PDF file with the proper software.
It may be possible to restor/upload/unpack these databases with other software and with Windows or other operating systems but those variations are beyond the scope of this guide.
The SCOPE of this GUIDE:
The purpose of this manual is not to be an exhaustive course in databases but to guide you through some basic use of the databases.
Realize that databases can, by their nature, be very large and may tax the capacity of your computer system. If so, it can cause problems or delays in processing. Handling databases does require a more up to date processor with sufficient capacity to handle the data.
Guide To Using Product Source Goldmine Databases
If you run into problems, please do not expect us to trouble shoot these problems for you. Instead, please consult a professional. You can hire database experts on sites such as Elance.com, RentaCoder.com, Guru.com and others. They can help you solve problems or develop applications to manipulate the databases and they usually do it at a reasonable cost.
This guide also shows you how to format the data once downloaded into Excel. This is covered in part two.
And finally, part three shows you how to turn links in the data into "live" (i.e., clickable) links, which may prove useful when transferred to DOC, PDF or even just kept in spreadsheet format.
For example, you may want to publish a PDF document with clickable links so that people could click on them and bring up the web site directly into their browsers.
In some cases, where the database is very large, you may want to make it more manageable by using a subset of the database or to put it into multiple volumes.
Please proceed to Tutorial # 1-Databases - MySQL Setup & Extracting To EXCEL (Or CALC) Guide To Using Product Source Goldmine Databases
1-Databases - MySQL Setup & Extracting To EXCEL
"I want to show examples of the source data in my Product Source Goldmine data.sql files in my sales pages. How do I do that"?
This tutorial will guide you through uploading and importing your Product Source Goldmine Databases using your domain host's MySQL Databases feature to upload your data files into a database and the phpMyAdmin feature to export that file in a file format (Microsoft Excel) that will allow you to edit the data.
Once imported into EXCEL and edited, you can save the file as an HTML document, or if you have Acrobat Reader or another PDF converter you can convert the file to a PDF document as a demo of the data contained in the files you are selling. NOTE: Considering the amount of data in these files, you may only want to convert them into HTML or PDF as abbreviated versions of the complete file.
To extract the Data from one of your Product Source Goldmine .sql Databases, you need to import the .sql file into a MySQL database using the MySQL Database feature in your domain server's Cpanel: You have to be hosting a domain with a company that provides Cpanel. In this tutorial I will be using HostMonster.com as they are very reliable and keep all their server software up to date.
The screen shots in this tutorial may not look exactly the same as your screen views if you're not using Hostmonster, but Cpanel layouts look much the same on any hosting company's systems. If you don't see something as described or pictured here, look/scroll around and you'll find something similar. If you can't, call your domain host's tech support.
