Main Window
Setup Dialog Box
DataBase Converter
Search Window
Simple Result Window
Expert Result Window
Detail Window
Movie Collection
Styles
Tips & Tricks
The main window is simple. The most important function (after converting the IMDB text files the first time you run JMDB) is to search in the database. In the toolbar there is a button to start a search. Alternatively, you can quickly open a Search Window by pressing ALT+S.
Before you start to use the database and search for infos on movies, you have to configure some settings.
In the General tab, you have to enter the location of the IMDB text files (Import Path). They are used when converting them into the MySQL database. The path to helpfile and soundfile (played after finishing a database request) have to be checked.
They are automatically set by the program at the first start and should be correct!
The Movie Collection Path is also automatically set up at the first program start. In that path you can edit and create your own movie collections, but we talk about that feature later!
The Number of results is not used yet.
Window Maximize Recognition is a workaround to be able to maximize the main window on a windows platform. Because there is no such feature in the Java standard (because not all the systems Java is running on support it), the program will try to recognize if the main window is maximized by looking at its position. A maximized window has the upper left corner at position (-4,-4) with a standard width of a window border and a size of (screenwidth+8)*(screenheight+8). If you have set the borderwidth of a window to another value (in Windows control panel), try to edit the Maximize Recognition Pixels value.
If you don't use a Windows platform, disable the Window Maximize Recognition feature.
Another nice feature is the Intelligent Window Positioning. It tries to find a place for the follow up window (the follow up window from the search window is for example the simple result window) without hinding another window. If there is enough space for the new window it is placed there with an Pixel Offset.
Enable logging means that some debug infos are written in "jmdb.log". In the actual version of JMDB you should turn this feature on, because we need this file to find bugs and other problems.
Because generally the first thing you do when using JMDB is opening a Search Window, you can enable search window automatically at program start that does this automatically. But it is only shown when the connection to the database could be established.
In the DB Setup tab, you can enter the settings for using the MySQL database. After configuriong the MySQL database as described in the Readme file, you enter the same values here and try to connect to the database by clicking on Test Connection.
If you have not yet converted any IMDb files you get a warning message. This is normal and everything is ok.
If you already converted the files and your database is working correctly you should get this message!
Finally if the database is not running, no connection could be established or the driver could not be loaded you should get this message!
The options you can change in the Simple Result Window tab decide which information is shown in the window beside the movie! You can also set if the table should be sorted after searching with the quick search (recommended; quicksearch => searching for name/title and aka).
If you disable some columns, the results are shown more quickly. Especially the apprearing actors and actresses take a lot of time.
You can also specify how the background color of the simple result windows should look like. You only have to enter the RGB values. The result is shown immediately in the box next to the entry fields.
The options you can change in the Detail Window Options tab decide which parts of information the detail windows show. If you disable some categories, the database query will finish more quickly but some information are missing.
Now you can also specify how the background color of the detail window should look like. You only have to enter the RGB values. The result is shown immediately in the box next to the entry fields.
In the Database Converter window you convert the IMDB text files into the MySQL database. If you started JMDB for the first time, you have to convert them before you can use the rest of JMDB.
The database consists of round about 42 database tables. For speedup when searching in the database, you should create indices.
All indices are automatically created when you use Convert + Index, but you can prevent the converter from creating both movies2actors indices by using Convert.
Because the conversion of the IMDb text files could last several hours (on an AMD Athlon 1.2 GHz it took 2 hours with all indices and that was fast!!!) you can create the missing indices later by selecting Index.
Creating only the Index talkes about 30 minutes on the AMD Athlon 1.2!
If you query the database for movie details the appearing actor can be found 10 seconds faster (AMD Athlon 1.2 GHz).
BEWARE:You can kill the complete database if you select Kill Database.
There is no Dialog behind that botton. If you select it, it deletes all database tables and the database itself.
This option is usefull if you want to update the database by converting the latest IMDb (TM) text files.
We don't plan to support the weekly IMDb (TM) update files, so you can only import the whole database.
To search for a string in one of the four main categories Movies, Actors, Directors and Producers is a basical function and regularly the first thing you do when using JMDB.
String Comparison means a simple search method, with Regular Expression, you can make more complex searches.
Examples for regular expression searches:
Read the MySQL documentation for learning more about regular expressions.
Begin With means to search only entries that start with the given expression, End With searches only entries that end with it.
Search AKAs means that not only the main database table but also the AKA table is searched for the given name/title.
The Quick option is for getting a quicker response for a database query. Instead of making all queries with the given expression and then creating the result window, the query is internally split up into some more queries and after each step, the result is added to the result window. (Queries are made in this order: BeginWith, BeginWith AKA, additional table columns (when checked in setup), substring, substring AKA, additional table columns).
When you select Expert Result Window you will have the result in one of these, but normally the Simple Result Window is the best choice.
In most cases, a Simple Result Window is what you need to get the informtion you wanted.
After searching for a movie, for example, you select the one you want to know more about and press Details,
or alternatively, you open the Detail Window by double-clicking on the item in the table.
A Simple Result Window is easy to use and looks simple, but you don't have the possibility to change something.
You can configure this window with the provided options in Simple Result Window tab from the Setup. You can make JMDB show additional columns like actors or directors directly in the simple resuilt window. You're also allowed change the sorting of the entries in the table by clicking on the header of the table!
With the loss of simplicity, the Expert Result Window gives you the possibility to change the set of data which was the result of a database search. After arranging the items by standard cut/copy/paste actions, you can start another search based on the items in the tree.
For an example, let's ask "Which directors have to do with some batman movies or with the actor Harrison Ford?".
For this query, the first thing to do is to make two searches, one for movies like batman, another one for actors like Ford, Harrison. After that, you have to copy some batman movies and the actor Harrison Ford together in one Expert Result Window by using the Copy and Paste buttons. (Drag and Drop is not supported by now.)
The result will be something like this.
Now, you select Out only for Directors and Or for Categories. Then press New Search.
The result will be an Expert Result Window showing all Directors which have to do with the selected batman movies or with Harrison Ford.
This Window shows details of the selected item in a Simple or Expert Result Window. You can configure what exactly is showed in here by changing the options in the Detail Window Options tab in the Setup Window.
Beside that, there is a toolbar shown over the details. If you want read eg. the plot of a movie you can click on the text plot and the detail window is moved to the location where the plot begins.
The last selected toolbar options are shown in another color, so the important options are easier to find.
Note that in a Movie Detail Window, the appearing actors are sorted by their importance they had in that movie.
The lower the number is in the < > the more important the actor/actresses was and the more money he or she earned.
As you can see here, in a Actor Detail Window, the movies in which the actor played are sorted by year.
You can also search further from the Detail Window! The movies, actors/actresses, director and producer are written in another color.
If you double click on those entries, a new search for that entry is executed and the results are shown in a new window.
If you don't want a new window simply hold down the left Alt-Key on your keyboard and double click on the entry. The result will then be shown in the same window you started the new search. This is working for the other windows as well.
Before going into details, you can find the Bookmark and your own collections in the Movie Collection Path you specified in the Setup. Normally that directory is located in the same directory you installed the program into.
We support bookmarking a movie. You can add a new entry by selecting the movie in the Result Window and selecting Bookmark.
For this, you write a table definition file like the ones that come with the JMDB package as samples. For an example, a column definition could look like
COLUMN = Rating ; 100 ; 100 ; 100 ; int ; 0xCEDEDE ; black
inside the definition file.
The data file for a movie collection is a standard CVS text files (you can export a spreadsheet table in this format with standard spreadsheet applications). For referencing an entry in the movie collection, the IMDB title (exactly the same text) is stored as "column 0" in the data file. This column is not visible in the table.
An interesting and useful thing is that you can write macro words in your data-file. This macro words are replaced in realtime when you open your movie collection window in JMDB. For example, you can write RATING as a macro word in your data files and RATING is replaced with the rating for that movie that is stored in the database. You don't have to insert that rating by yourself. Another advantage is that when you import newer IMDB text files some day, the rating of that new files is used. The data is always up to date by that way!
An example how the result looks like is shown below. Please read the sample files to learn more, they're documented well. It's easier as you think.
Please do not use the same files as the examples, because with an update the files could be overwritten by mistake.
Since year 2002 JMDB supports different styles using the Java LookAndFeel which allows you to change the look of windows, buttons, entry fields and so on.
If you select another styles from the ones available in the Styles menu the selected style is activated directly, so you don't have to restart the program.
The default style, the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) selects normally when you run a java program, is marked in the menu as system default.
If a style is not available but the JRE says it's supported, an error is shown in the debug screen (UnsupportedLookAndFeelException) and the styles is not changed.
This could happen for example under OS/2 (or eCS) with the Windows-Style, but Windows Style is available with windows.jar file under \java11\Swing!
We will support more styles in the future, because they can really easy be implemented in the program. There are BeOS, Kunststoff and other styles available at no cost!
Metal LookAndFeel
Motif LookAndFeel
