Info Select

In a clean out I came across an old 3.5 in. floppy disk box. It still had some disks in it, including backups of my InfoSelect install disk. There were also upgrade disks for Datacad 6 (released by Cadkey in the mid 1990s), an application called 'Squiggle' which made CAD drawings look hand-drawn, and a patch for the single user version of Alpha 4 database.

I decided to see what the disks revealled.

The Alpha 4 disk was readable, so I copied its contents to the HD; neither Squiggle, nor Datacad could be read, but I think I've already got them onto CD; but the InfoSelect! I'd forgotten about this. So I loaded it up: first disk: much grinding of drive, then a 'not formatted' message. Trash that one. Second disk: I got a directory list out of it; but couldn't copy the files due to a failed 'read'. However, they did copy one at a time, so, up and running in a DOS box!

Info Select does one thing really well. It quickly enters and stores text notes, and has a fabulous search function. I used to use it as a memory resident application in DOS, and it was great at what it did.

More recent versions, from the first Windows version, went Baroque, however: too much unnecessary elaboration around the great core functionality, and it got bogged down in 'featureitis.