askSam SDKby asKSam Systems
The askSam database engine is a flexible, full-text searchable, database engine designed to deal with both structured and unstructured information.
The Flexible Full-Text Engine to Drive Your Applications
The askSam database engine is a flexible, full-text searchable, database
engine designed to deal with both structured and unstructured information.
Unlike traditional databases, the askSam engine frees you from tables and
pre-defined structures. There's no better tool for handling applications with
free-form data, data with differing formats, or data that needs to be quickly
and easily searched - applications that organize email, medical records, legal
texts, resumes, imaged or scanned documents, meta-information, and document
management. askSam will save you time and money in your development efforts.
The askSam advantage
The askSam Engine was designed to be fast and flexible. It provides a different
approach from traditional databases for managing and searching information.
Flexibility
- askSam was designed to deal with unstructured and structured
information.
- A single database can contain data with multiple structures. The
askSam Engine is a great met repository for applications that
gather different types of information.
- Save text, data, and information without pre defining structure
or tables.
- The askSam Engine can automatically use structure inherent in
your data as fields. For example, the words Subject:, Date:, To:,
and From: in email messages can be used as fields in an askSam
database. Similarly, Web Forms can post directly to an askSam
database with tags for the information.
- No predefined field lengths and no limits to field size.
- Support for repeating fields (for example multiple fields for a
contact history).
- Import API supports importing different data types text, RTF,
HTML, Word, Delimited, and more.
- Sort and Output fields or output document fragments from your
data (for example hit context).
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Ease of Development
- Import and publish the askSam Engine is ideal for
database-driven Web sites. It can import a variety of common
formats into the database and natively return data in HTML format.
- Flexibility leads to simplicity. Because askSam does not require
structure, field lengths, or tables, you'll find that many
applications are quick and easy to get up and running. They are
also easy to maintain and modify.
- Native support for outputting data in Text, HTML, or RTF format.
- Simple, but powerful reporting features are built into askSam.
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Searches - Powerful & Fast
- Extremely fast full text searches.
- Full text indexing of entire database askSam can search in
specific fields or through any field or text in the entire
database.
- Support for Text, Date, Numeric, Proximity, Wildcard, Fuzzy,
& Boolean Searches.
- Search in Remembered Document Sets.
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High Performance / Low Resources
- Database engine size - approximately 1.3 MB
- Low memory requirements for server connections
- Supports a large number of users and many databases on a single server.
System Requirements
To create your documents and databases, you will need a copy of askSam 5. askSam requires:
- 16 MB of RAM
- 130 MB of disk space (plus the space required by your documents and databases)
- Windows 95, 98, NT, ME, 2000, XP, 2003
To create Web-based applications:
- IIS Web server running Windows 95, 98, NT, 2000, XP, or 2003 (We
recommend Windows NT, Windows 2000, XP Professional or Windows 2003
running NTFS)
- IDE (Integrated Development Environment) such as VisualStudio.NET,
Visual Interdev or Notepad (ASP applications)
To create Windows applications:
- IDE such as VisualStudio, Visual Studio.NET, or Borland C++
Programming Languages/Platforms Supported:
- Visual Basic, ASP
- .NET, C#
- C++
Plus, the askSam 5.1 SDK includes sample applications and code.
Features
The askSam engine is feature rich.
- Entering & Editing Data
askSam is extremely flexible in dealing with data. Information is
stored in documents rather than in tables, and the database can
return specific fields, document fragments, or all data from a
document. askSam can return data as text, HTML, or RTF.
- Ideal for Unstructured Data and Multi-Structured Data
askSam has features to simplify working with unstructured data.
Structure inherent in documents (for example words like
"To:", "From:", and "Subject:" in an
email message) can be used as fields by askSam. askSam allows
documents with different structures to be stored in a database.
- Fast, Powerful Searches
AskSam uses a powerful and efficient indexing routine to make
all information in a database instantly accessible. AskSam
searches through huge databases instantly. In addition, askSam
offers a wide variety of searches: full-text, date, numeric,
proximity, fuzzy, and more.
- Flexible Search Results
Search results can include document names, specific fields,
hit content, and fragments from a document. The results can be
sorted by relevancy, date, or by any other field.
- Report Features
Powerful reporting features are built into askSam. askSam
can group and sort data, total fields, and more.
- Security / Encryption
AskSam allows you to password protect and encrypt your
databases. AskSam supports 128 bit encryption.
- Email Applications
askSam supports features that make it an ideal tool for
applications to organize and manage email. Special
filters for importing email, capabilities to recognize
To:, From:, Subject: and Date: as fields in email
messages. In addition, askSam properly interprets the
date format used in email messages and can search and
sort using this date format.
- Bibliographic and Library Applications
Bibliographic and library applications often require
flexibility not found in standard databases. The
ability to easily handle multiple data types (books,
journals, reports, articles, etc.), capabilities to
support multiple authors, long titles, and more.
askSam provides features to handle bibliographical information.
- Hypertext
askSam supports hypertext links. You can include links in document that help navigate through your
databases. You can also include links to Web pages.
- Return Data as Text, HTML, or RTF
You can return data from askSam in several different formats: Text, HTML, and RTF. askSam's
Export API allows you to export an individual document, selected documents, a remembered subset
of documents, or an entire database.
- Self-maintaining databases - No DBA
askSam databases do not need to tuned or optimized by a DBA (database administrator).
Indexes automatically update, and an optimization routine can automatically pack and
optimize databases.
- Graphics / Images
You can include graphics and images in your databases. askSam supports a variety of graphic formats as well as OLE.
- Attachments / BLOBs
You can attach files to your askSam documents. This attachments are handled as blobs and askSam can return them in their
- Support for Large Databases
askSam can support databases up to 16 terabytes in size.
- Multi-user support
The askSam database supports multiple users.
- Web-Ready
Easily create Web applications with the askSam database. Since askSam can return data in HTML format, it's quick
and easy to Web-enable your askSam applications.
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