Congratulations Adrian and the crew at ASC. I have long been impressed by 
the usability of the Oakland block reports, and assume your other projects 
are easily useable, and all because of this database. The University of 
Nebraska Press will be publishing the results of a massive comparative study 
I did using your Oakland data and that of many other archaeologists later 
this year or early next year (Margaret Purser kindly wrote our conclusion 
chapter). Without examining the particulars of the database, I will speak 
for the results. IT WORKS, FOLKS!! If you don't have one set up for 
yourself, by all means, GO FOR IT!

(And, shamelessly, I make a plug) keep an eye out for ELDORADO! THE 
ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE NORTHERN GOLD RUSHES, edited by Catherine Holder Spude, 
Robin O. Mills, Karl Gurcke and Roderick Sprague, with an introductory 
chapter by Don Hardesty and conclusion by Margaret Purser, coming to you 
from Historical Archaeology and the University of Nebraska Press, hopefully 
sometime in 2009 or 2010.


Cathy



Catherine Holder Spude, PhD
7 Avenida Vista Grande #145
Santa Fe, NM 87508
505-466-1476 home
505-913-1326 cell

"Life is not tried, it is merely survived if you are standing outside the 
fire," Jenny Yates and Garth Brooks.

--------------------------------------------------
From: "Adrian Praetzellis" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, February 03, 2009 9:07 PM
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: New artifact cataloging program - SHARD

> *SHARD, *our artifact cataloging program, has just been posted.
>
> http://www.sonoma.edu/asc/shard
>
> Download it free, gratis, and for nothing, and start happy cataloging 
> today!
>
> *SHARD* provides a consistent and (mostly) idiot‐proof system of 
> pull-down
> menus to catalog artifacts/artefacts from mid‐19th to 
> early‐20th‐century
> archaeological sites and to create data tables that facilitate comparison.
>
> Although we at ASC have been excavating urban sites since the 1970s, the
> impetus to create *SHARD* came from a series of hugely productive
> archaeological projects in the 1990s and early 2000s sponsored by the
> California Department of Transportation. These massive San Francisco Bay
> Area undertakings required a whole new way of recording and tabulating the
> nearly 1,000,000 individual items recovered from the excavations.
>
> Bootleg versions of ASC's heretofore unnamed cataloging system have been
> circulating on the archaeological underground for several years. It has
> taken quite some time and a whole lot of volunteer effort to get to the
> point of releasing this definitive edition of *SHARD* to the 
> archaeological
> community. Kind comments and suggestions are welcome. However, this has 
> been
> a labor of love so we're really not that interested in hearing how you 
> would
> have done it oh so much better if only we'd thought to ask.
>
> *SHARD* is built on *MS Office Access 2003*, so you'll need that program 
> to
> run it. Everyone is free to use, reproduce, and adapt it to best suits 
> their
> needs. *SHARD* was created by archaeologists Erica Gibson and Mary
> Praetzellis; Bryan Much helped with database design in Access. The Manual
> was written by Erica Gibson.
>
> Regards,
>
> Adrian Praetzellis
>
> Sonoma State University
>
> California, USA
>
> Adrian DOT Praetzellis AT Sonoma DOT edu
>