Hi All
I've been using Excel to catalogue and track my wines for about 9 years now.
I use different sheets for whites & reds and lookup values to cross
reference what year I should be drinking them and I put my notes in cells.
Well this has degenerated into a bit of pigs breakfast, I have drunk 2 wines
today that got a bit lost in the system (bad formulas I think or maybe just
bad management ) and were well past their best. These were wines I had
enjoyed in the past & I was tracking their development in my notes. I think
the excel thing worked when my collection was smaller and more easily
accessible. I now have a (completely full) Kitchener wine cabinet with 410
bottle capacity. The wines are closely packed, 2 deep and access to labels
etc. is difficult. I'm after a program (I googled and was amazed at the
availability) that someone has used and could recommend. The important
things for me is the ability to write my notes (and add to them as the wines
develop) track the wines physical position in the cabinet and have the
ability to put in "best before" dates. What say you AFWers.
Cheers Andrew

I've used "Cellar" for a number of years and really find it easy to use
and Art is a regular here...again.

I don't use it myself (I have a homemade system too). But I've heard
a lot of good things about CellarTracker, and it seems to be gaining a
lot of traction.

http://www.cellartracker.com

--
Steve Slatcher
http://pobox.com/~steve.slatcher

I'm using AvosVins and happy with it.

Bi!! wrote:
> I've used "Cellar" for a number of years and really find it easy to use
> and Art is a regular here...again.
>

I've tried a dozen or so different programs over the years, including
several attempts at home-grown, and have found Cellar! to be the best
overall. There are some limitations that I don't care for, such as the
awful print engine, but overall I like it fine. I've now been using it for
about 2 years, and track ~1,000 bottles.

Cheers,
Gary

"Andrew Goldfinch" > wrote in message
...
> Hi All
> I've been using Excel to catalogue and track my wines for about 9 years
> now. I use different sheets for whites & reds and lookup values to cross
> reference what year I should be drinking them and I put my notes in cells.
> Well this has degenerated into a bit of pigs breakfast, I have drunk 2
> wines today that got a bit lost in the system (bad formulas I think or
> maybe just bad management ) and were well past their best. These were
> wines I had enjoyed in the past & I was tracking their development in my
> notes. I think the excel thing worked when my collection was smaller and
> more easily accessible. I now have a (completely full) Kitchener wine
> cabinet with 410 bottle capacity. The wines are closely packed, 2 deep and
> access to labels etc. is difficult. I'm after a program (I googled and was
> amazed at the availability) that someone has used and could recommend. The
> important things for me is the ability to write my notes (and add to them
> as the wines develop) track the wines physical position in the cabinet and
> have the ability to put in "best before" dates. What say you AFWers.
> Cheers Andrew

I've used Microsoft Access to track my 200 bottle cellar for years now.
Seems to work quite well. I can send you the file if you have the program.

--
Joe Giorgianni
TheWho.org

"This guitar has seconds to live" Posters

Put me down as a Cellar! user. It works for me.

"Andrew Goldfinch" > wrote in message
...
> Hi All
> I've been using Excel to catalogue and track my wines for about 9 years
> now. I use different sheets for whites & reds and lookup values to cross
> reference what year I should be drinking them and I put my notes in cells.
> Well this has degenerated into a bit of pigs breakfast, I have drunk 2
> wines today that got a bit lost in the system (bad formulas I think or
> maybe just bad management ) and were well past their best. These were
> wines I had enjoyed in the past & I was tracking their development in my
> notes. I think the excel thing worked when my collection was smaller and
> more easily accessible. I now have a (completely full) Kitchener wine
> cabinet with 410 bottle capacity. The wines are closely packed, 2 deep and
> access to labels etc. is difficult. I'm after a program (I googled and was
> amazed at the availability) that someone has used and could recommend. The
> important things for me is the ability to write my notes (and add to them
> as the wines develop) track the wines physical position in the cabinet and
> have the ability to put in "best before" dates. What say you AFWers.
> Cheers Andrew
>

cellartracker : really good online system


"Steve Slatcher" > a écrit dans le message de news:
...
>
> I don't use it myself (I have a homemade system too). But I've heard
> a lot of good things about CellarTracker, and it seems to be gaining a
> lot of traction.
>
> http://www.cellartracker.com
>
> --
> Steve Slatcher
> http://pobox.com/~steve.slatcher

On Sun, 30 Jan 2005 05:08:40 GMT, "Andrew Goldfinch"
> wrote:

>Hi All
>I've been using Excel to catalogue and track my wines for about 9 years now.
>I use different sheets for whites & reds and lookup values to cross
>reference what year I should be drinking them and I put my notes in cells.
>Well this has degenerated into a bit of pigs breakfast, I have drunk 2 wines
>today that got a bit lost in the system (bad formulas I think or maybe just
>bad management ) and were well past their best. These were wines I had
>enjoyed in the past & I was tracking their development in my notes. I think
>the excel thing worked when my collection was smaller and more easily
>accessible. I now have a (completely full) Kitchener wine cabinet with 410
>bottle capacity. The wines are closely packed, 2 deep and access to labels
>etc. is difficult. I'm after a program (I googled and was amazed at the
>availability) that someone has used and could recommend. The important
>things for me is the ability to write my notes (and add to them as the wines
>develop) track the wines physical position in the cabinet and have the
>ability to put in "best before" dates. What say you AFWers.
>Cheers Andrew
>

Many folks have already mentioned Cellar! as a great dedicated
software for maintaining your wine data. For several years I wrote
software reviews for small magazines such as Computer Edge, Peak
Computing, and Windows OnLine Review. I also did shareware reviews for
seven years for the Ziff-Davis Shareware Library.

Here's the text of a review I wrote in May 2002 for Computer Edge
Magazine on Cellar! (keep in mind that the software has continued to
develop since then and while the download link is probably still good,
some features may be enhanced and pricing may have changed:

Shareware Safari: Networked Wineware
By Ed Rasimus

One of the best things you can do with a computer is keep track of
stuff. Cataloging and sorting large collections of almost anything is
easy and even if you aren't into database design there are plenty of
excellent applications available in the shareware world that merely
require that you enter your information to take full advantage of the
power.

Probably my favorite application of database software has been wine
cellar management. Sure, you can keep track of your collection of
ante-bellum, rural American wooden widgets with a computer database,
but it isn't as much fun as conducting the relevant research of
acquiring, managing and, most importantly, tasting your wine
collection. There are all sorts of details to log such as wineries,
varietals, regions, appellations, vintages, costs and tasting notes.
You can track you collection's value, monitor the development of the
wine, maybe even scan and organize the labels.

There's no shortage of wine cellar software, but my favorite for
personal use has been Cellar! for at least the last six years.
Recently I had the opportunity to upgrade to the newest version, 3.1,
which finally makes the transition to 32- bit software. Based on the
MS Jet database engine that drives Access, Cellar! has always offered
a powerful relational database with incredible sorting, filtering and
searching capability. The question was where could the program go that
would provide increased functionality that wasn't simply extraneous
bells and whistles? I've seen too many programs bloat with animations
and graphics that really were little more than pasted-in excess.

The answer is networking. Cellar! remains a powerful database with
quick conversion of your older version records to the new format, or
import of your data from whatever other application you've been using
to keep track of your bottles. The big upgrade, however, is the
ability to share your information with other wine lovers. A simple
click on the Cellar! Online button lets you exchange information from
your notes on wines that you've collected and tasted with literally
thousands of other users. Find a new wine and want to make sure you've
got all the information necessary to properly catalog the winery? Sure
you could search the label and painstakingly enter the name, address,
phone, zip and region, assuming that you could find it. But, with
Cellar! Online, you now can have the software query the master
database and automatically update your local winery table records.
You'll seldom acquire a bottle that won't already have Cellar! info
available.

Been doing a bit of research on wines? Maybe you've found some
informative web-sites or stored some links to winery homepages. You
can quickly share your records with other users of the program with
just a mouse click. A visit to the developer home page at
http://www.cellarwinesoftware.com/index.html will show the latest
count of shared wine records, wineries, tasting notes and downloads of
the trial software.

Of course, there is still plenty of local, un-shared control of your
data. You can sort your records on virtually any field, enter data
with bar-code scans, share your PC records with your PDA, and generate
tables, graphs and data summaries of your collection. Configurability
is incredible with plenty of power to organize on country of origin,
region/DOC, varietals or maybe price. The overview table lets you see
if wines are white or red, whether they are ready to drink or maybe
need a bit of age, and where they came from. When you consume a
bottle, you can easily grade it or add detailed tasting notes. The
multi-page record of each wine offers opportunity to enter as much or
as little data as you wish.

The real power of the program is online. Not everyone will be eager to
exchange cellar data and that's fine. You can still benefit from the
Web links. Want to check a vintage chart? Maybe you need a definition
from the wine encyclopedia? How about a rating from Wine Spectator or
Wine Enthusiast? Or maybe you want to check the latest auction prices
on rare and fine wines? It's all at your fingertips. Best of all, as
you use the program you will be building an increasing collection of
links to information about wines, wineries, values and experiences.

You can download a demo of Cellar! from the web page and you can
register the software for $49.95. For most of us, that's the cost of a
couple of bottles of wine. Once you've started using the software,
you'll be amazed at the way the program broadens your wine enjoyment.
If you will be entering a tasting note, you'll take a few moments
longer to consider the flavors and experiences. When some time has
gone by, you'll find yourself toggling the "zero balance" button to
look back at wines that you've enjoyed over the past months and years,
even if you no longer have them in your cellar. Five bottles or five
hundred, you'll enjoy your wine more with Cellar!

Ed Rasimus
Fighter Pilot (USAF-Ret)
"When Thunder Rolled"
www.thunderchief.org

On Sun, 30 Jan 2005 14:03:29 GMT, "CabFan"
> wrote:

>I've tried a dozen or so different programs over the years, including
>several attempts at home-grown, and have found Cellar! to be the best
>overall. There are some limitations that I don't care for, such as the
>awful print engine, but overall I like it fine. I've now been using it for
>about 2 years, and track ~1,000 bottles.
>
>Cheers,
>Gary

I also use and like Cellar!. I think it's best feature is the ability
to download producer information and tasting notes from other users.

Also, Gary - if you haven't already, get the recent update, there is a
big improvement to the print engine - you can even export reports to
Word or Excel files.

dalem

On 30-Jan-2005, Zo > wrote:

> >I've tried a dozen or so different programs over the years, including
> >several attempts at home-grown, and have found Cellar! to be the best
> >overall. There are some limitations that I don't care for, such as the
> >awful print engine, but overall I like it fine. I've now been using it
> >for
> >about 2 years, and track ~1,000 bottles.
> >
> >Cheers,
> >Gary
>
> I also use and like Cellar!. I think it's best feature is the ability
> to download producer information and tasting notes from other users.
>
> Also, Gary - if you haven't already, get the recent update, there is a
> big improvement to the print engine - you can even export reports to
> Word or Excel files.
>
> dalem

I have been running version 3.4.9 for a while, and did not see that 3.5.0
was available. I am downloading today, and according to the update notes it
should fix the print issues. Thanks for heads-up.

Gary

"Andrew Goldfinch" > wrote in
:

> The important things for me is the ability to write my notes (and add
> to them as the wines develop) track the wines physical position in the
> cabinet and have the ability to put in "best before" dates. What say
> you AFWers. Cheers Andrew
>

Andrew, I use Cellar! and am satisfied with it. I am tracking a couple
hundred bottles.

You can track wines physical position using whatever convention you want
(e.g., 1-5, or R-7). I don't and just say "Rack" or something else that
gets me close to the location.

You can add your tasting notes and also comments elsewhere. I really
like being able to pull tasting notes down from the net.

If you want a "best before" you can either figure out how to use the
drink profile--I have not really even looked at that--or take one of the
user defined fields (table columns in the display) and label it "Drink
Before" and then put in your guess of when to drink the wine.

Hope this helps.

Bill Hogsett

Well thanks to every one who has taken the time to pass on their
reccomendations. I think I will have a crack at Cellar.
Cheers Andrew