Set Up and Run the Filter

The results that appear in the Table Data View list all songs and albums by Herbie Hancock in my music library. To narrow my search down to just songs in one of the three albums, I could create another query by repeating the five steps above, but there is an easier way. I use the Standard Filter in the Table Data View from this query result.

If the Table Data View is not already open, I can click on the Queries icon in the Database section Next I double-click Query_MyTable, and the Table Data View opens (Figure 11).

Figure 11: The Table Data View dialog.

From there, I click on the Standard Filter icon in toolbar (Figure 12). In the Standard Filter dialog that opens, I select Album from the Field name drop-down list and like from the Condition drop-down list. Note: Using the like condition allows the use of wildcards to match partial strings in the Value field.

Figure 12: Selecting filter criteria in the Standard Filter dialog.

Next I enter the artist name in the Value text box. The Value string is case sensitive and requires exact spelling. Again I use the SQL wildcard percent (%) character (e.g., %Speak%), in place of the full album name Speak Like A Child. Other filter conditions can be applied to either the Artist, Song, or Album fields.

Filter Result

As shown from the six song tracks in Figure 13, the standard filter narrowed the album information to one album, Speak Like A Child.

Figure 13: Using the standard filter to narrow results down to one album.

This was a simple example to illustrate that by following the process I've described, LibreOffice can easily be used to migrate music information from iTunes into a searchable database and perform simple to moderately complex database queries.

Summary

To facilitate the database creation and query process for users that may have minimal familiarity with SQL, I used wizards to create a database table and SQL query. More sophisticated SQL users could write more complex queries and table relationships. Those features are available in LibreOffice Base.

Although I used the LibreOffice Base embedded database engine HSQLDB, Base can also connect to other popular SQL databases such as MySQL, MariaDB, and PostgreSQL, to name a few.

For users who need to create and manage one or more databases for personal, educational, or home office use, LibreOffice is faster to implement, simpler, and has a built-in user interface. LibreOffice achieves the same goals as the more complicated MySQL for simple to moderately complex database queries.

The Author

John Cofield is a retired software marketing manager in Northern California. His training is in electrical engineering, and he has worked at multiple Silicon Valley semiconductor and software companies. His non-technical interests include Jazz music, ranging from Modal to Fusion.