Connect to my database

[rbjordan]

Hi All....

As the topic summary states: I am a "newbie with no clue!"

I own, (and play site administrator) for an online e-commerce business that
first made its internet debut back in 1999. My site is written in Cold Fusion
and is hosted by a 3rd party provider on a dedicated SQL server and Data
server. Although I have picked up working knowlege of HTML over the years and
thusly armed have been able to make/add minor changes to my site, I want
desparately to learn Cold Fusion so that I can make all those changes/additions
that have evaded my ability up until now. - - In anticipation of that day, I
have loaded a Dev copy of CF7 as well as SQL server onto my laptop PC,
(running Windows XP Home Edition), as well as a copy of "Eben Hewitts" Cold
Fusion Training course. Although it is "old" , (CF 5), I am finding it very
exciting and informative. Surprisingly, I have been able to do all of the
"projects" that it asks you to complete at the end of each "lecture".

However, I have come to a point where two lessons are about to be given on
Relational databases......and I find myself utterly and helplessly lost! The
beginning of the lecture instructs you to go into the CF Administrator and
"create a CF data source so that Cold Fusion can connect to my database". No
Problem!.....except that Microsoft XP Home Edition does not have Microsoft
Access", (nor does Eben Hewitt recommend that you use it), and I don't have a
database on my laptop to "connect" to. Until I am comfortable that I won't
"Break" my real site, I want to be able to create a database locally on my PC
and play around with CF programming here where it's safe to do so.

My obvious question is: How do I create a database file, stored locally on my
PC, that I CAN connect to? (I remember fooling around years ago on another
older PC that you could simply open Microsoft Access and create and name a data
base and then go back later on to access and edit it as needed). What do I do
now?

Please help out a newbie?
Thanks
Bob

[paross1]

Rather than purchase Access, you can download [url]http://www.mysql.com/[/url] for free.
It is a great database, and works very well with ColdFusion. Of course, this
will be one more area where you will have to do your homework, and relational
databases pose a much steeper learning curve than you will have with
ColdFusion, but once you become familiar with both, you should be set.

Phil

[rbjordan]

Thanks for the quick reply.....

Is the "My SQL" redundant to what I have already loaded onto my laptop, (Dev
copy of Microsoft SQL Server, Macromedia Cold Fusion 7).

I checked out "MySQL" and am not certain which one I download??
Windows Essentials (x86)
Windows (x86)
Without installer (unzip in C:\)
Windows x64 downloads
Windows Essentials (AMD64 / Intel EM64T)
Without installer (AMD64 / Intel EM64T)
Windows Server 2003 (AMD64 / Intel EM64T)

Thanks
Bob

[paross1]

If you have SQL Server, you might try going with that, although you may have
"fun" getting the development version to talk to ColdFuison on an XP Home
edition PC without some extra tweaking (driver issues, I believe.) At any rate,
you are going to need to do a lot of reading, as it is beyond the scope of a
single forum post to be able to talk someone through everything that you will
need to learn to install and configure ColdFusion with a database if you know
nothing about relational databases. First get your database up and running and
learn something about relational databases and SQL, then work on adding data
sources to ColdFusion, etc. Baby steps.

Phil