Flash! The TDGT Data Generator Tool from IRS is now available here. This tool allows you to move data between an Excel spreadsheet and an Oracle database.

The most valuable parts of the program are the parts that deal with changes in the structure of the database. If you import or generate data, then someone changes the structure of the table, the program will change the data (in as lossless a way as we could figure out) to make the data fit the new structure. In particular, if a column name is changed, the program adds the new column, then asks if you want to delete the old column. You can answer "no", then copy the data from the old column to the new column, then run the export again. If the length of a string shrinks, the program will check the existing data. If it all fits in the new length, it displays an info message and changes the field length. If some data won't fit, the program says so and gives you the opportunity to fix it yourself before it truncates it.

I wrote an article describing this program in Volume 4, Issue 2 of STQE (Software Testing and Quality Engineering) magazine. It's the Tool Look column.

We plan to revise this program to make it talk to more databases, to make it easier to configure, and probably to rewrite it in Java so more people can use it. If you do make changes to it, please send me a copy of the changes you made, and I might fold them back into the original.

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If I live long enough, I'm going to write "Pat McGee's Cyclopaedia of Odd World Knowledge." I like learning new things, and writing them down. I find that I don't learn things until they come out of my fingers. Just hearing or reading isn't enough.

So, when I learn something, I often write about it. This web page collects some mini-essays that I've written about various topics over the past few years, with some occasional comments on them by other people. (If you'd like your comments added, email me.) As I add more interesting essays to my collection of knowledge, I'll put them here.

J.B., if you're reading this, "Happy Ruibnug!"

Pat

Ryan Knowles wrote the first version of this website. Thanks, Ryan.