ABPC borrower no more...and thoughts on the same...

I received my very own copy of American Book Prices Current on CDRom today. It is, as most you you know, the cornerstone of a bookdealer's reference library...a cornerstone that I have been borrowing for far too long. No longer! They have been doing this (aggregating auction sales and the like) for 111 years, impressive in its own right. The CD version (much faster and, in theory, more thorough) covers 1975 to 2006 and includes over 800,000 records. I am extremely pleased and having way too much fun with it...I can spend amazing amounts of time looking at things like this.

Now the "other" issue. I am very tempted to use my getting ABPC as an excuse to upgrade my 17in Apple Ti-Book to one of the new Mac Book Pros. This is, of course, because ABPC *only* works on a PC (and I can dual-boot a macbookpro). I am assuming rather than building this on one of the myriad of extremely sophisticated relational databases, ABPC is built on custom code...cool and geeky...but, you know, urgh. The real issue, however, is not that it only runs on a PC, but that the UI is...er...challenged.

The instructions indicate that you need to have at least "an IBM PC or compatible computer (386 or above preferable)" (apropos of nothing, I have one...as a linux box, very stable and happy in its extreme old age (mind you, couldn't run windoze to save its life)). The reason it mentions a 386 is that was likely the dominant chip when this DB was created...circa late 1980s-very early 1990s. I am about to turn 40 and the last time I remember seeing an interface like this I was in High School. It is an absolutely outstanding tool....in desperate need of a facelift.

That said, it works fine and there is that whole "if it ain't broke" approach. I was going to email them about the UI, but couldn't find my 300baud modem *g*. It is a good thing the db is so rock awesome.

UPDATE: I wrote a quick note to ABPC touching on the above (i.e. great product, slightly scary interface) and received a wonderful response from Katharine Kyes Leab (ABPC's Editor-in-Chief). In it, she notes, "We know that the framework of the CD is hilariously clunky," and that they thought the DOS version was cleaner (which, undoubtedly, was true). The big *news* is that she indicates that the Web version will be rolling out in March of this year ($135 if you have the CDs, $25 if you return your CD and go web-only). She also indicated that they are in the process of bringing the CD into the 21st century. I, for one, can't wait...