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Bento is essentially a flat-file database application although it does contain some basic relational functionality despite great efforts having been made to hiding the inner complexities from the user.

If the above sentence has left you scratching your head then you need to read this article because it will explain what a database is, what a flat-file database is and what relational functionality is.
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If you are new to databases then the whole area of fields, records, tables and forms in Bento Libraries may be somewhat confusing, especially understanding how forms relate to fields and records. The short video, below, will hopefully help to visually explain this. Read more

As of Bento 1.0v2, it appears that when you export data the CSV file may not be properly formed if any of your fields contain one or more double-quotes. The CSV file format allows for each field to be surrounded by double-quotes and to avoid confusion with these, any double-quotes which appear in a field are doubled-up. In Bento’s case, the issue seems to be that for each double-quote in the field, the closing double-quote is moved one character to the left.

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When you link two Libraries via a Related Records List Bento manages the links internally which makes life easier for most people but can present a problem if you want to import two CSV files which contain related data and link them back together. There is currently no automatic way to re-link the data but you can make life much easier with a bit of planning.
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When you export data from Bento to a CSV file there is no way to specify the order that the fields will be exported in and Bento simply exports the data in the order that the fields were created. This can be a problem if you are going to use the data in, for example, a pre-existing Numbers document where you need the columns to be displayed in a particular order.

The way to get around this is to follow these steps:

1. Export the data from Bento as a CSV file.
2. Open the CSV file in a spreadsheet such as Numbers or Excel.
3. Re-order the columns in the spreadsheet.
4. Export the data as a CSV file from the spreadsheet.
5. Import this new CSV file into Bento, creating a new Library.
6. If you want to, delete the original Library and rename the new one to give it the original Library’s name.

Now, whenever this Library is exported the fields will be in the correct order.

The Bento User Guide is available from within Bento via the Help menu as a PDF document. As of version 1.0v2 of Bento it is 100 pages long and, although I would not suggest reading it from cover to cover, it is worth skimming through it to familiarise yourself with it as it contains a lot of useful information and tips which you may otherwise miss.

Unfortunately there is no printed version available, even in the boxed version. If you want to print your own version but would like to reduce the paper usage, remember that you can always go to the ‘Layout’ print settings and change the number of pages per sheet and two pages per sheet is still readable as long as you have reasonable eyesight or glasses.

One of the areas which seems to cause the most confusion for Bento users is that of Related Records Lists. I am therefore delighted to say that I have written a guide to them which will hopefully explain what they can do, when they should be used, and how they are used.

The guide was meant to be fairly comprehensive but also fairly concise but the number of screenshots involved in making it a good visual guide meant that it quickly evolved into a fairly lengthy document so it will initially be released as a PDF and I will try to break it up into a series of actual articles over the next few days.

Comments and suggestions are, as ever, most welcome.

Download the Related Records Lists Guide.

I am delighted to announce that Don McAllister of ScreenCastsOnline has very kindly decided to make part one of his excellent two-part Bento screencast available for free and is offering a 20% discount off the membership fee of ScreenCastsOnline if you use the promotional code BENTO.

Part one of the screencast covers the following topics:

• Introduction to Bento
• The Bento Interface
• Core Concepts - Libraries and Collections
• Address Book Integration
• Records & Table View
• Form Views
• Creating a Library
• Adding Fields
• Form Customisation
• Themes
• Advanced Find
• Smart Collections

The topics covered in part two include:

• iCal Event and Task Integration
• How you might use iCal integration
• Additional Bento Fields
• Printing Tables and Forms
• Creating Mailing Labels
• How to import Data into Bento
• Backing up Your Data

ScreenCastsOnline is a weekly video podcast with a new Mac related tutorial published every week via iTunes. A full six month membership costs only $39 with the special discount coupon code allowing you to receive the next 26 brand new weekly shows. In addition, membership gives you immediate access to over 140+ HD tutorials featuring many different Mac related software tutorials including the second part of the Bento tutorial. For more information on becoming a ScreenCastsOnline Extra! member visit www.screencastsonline.com/extra and don’t forget to use the code BENTO.

The first Bento tutorial is available as a QuickTime MOV file which you can download or watch in your web browser below. Click on the small monitor icon to view the tutorial full screen.