Installing the Contacts Database

The Contacts Database is not provided as turn-key solution. It is provided in the hope that it can form the basis of a customized database. To work correctly, it requires a number of components.

• Python — Scripting language that can be downloaded for free for both Windows and Linux from www.python.org.
• MySQL — Database that can be downloaded for free for both Windows and Linux from www.mysql.com.
• Stunnel — Universal SSL Wrapper that can be downloaded for free for both Windows and Linux from www.stunnel.org.
• Rekall — Source code can be downloaded for free for from www.rekallrevealed.org. Binary packages can be downloaded for a small charge from www.totalrekall.co.uk. Please see the note below.
• The database forms, reports and schema which can be downloaded from the bottom of this page.

Note about Rekall and Open Source

There is often some confusion about what "Open Source" means. Open Source software is not neccessarily free. In fact most Open Source licences allow anyone to charge any price for distributing software. The term Open Source implies that the source code to the software must be distributed with any package or available to anyone who receives one, and that any recipient of the sofwtare has the right to freely distribute the software themselves.

Rekall is an Open Source project and in fact the source code is available for no charge from the link above. It is fairly straightforward to compile a binary version for Linux and in fact an increasing number of Linux distributions are shipping with a copy of Rekall.

To build the Windows version, the QT libraries are required. These are not Open Source for Windows and you can either purchase these from Trolltech for several thousand pounds, or pay the small fee to the authors of Rekall for a Windows binary by following the link above.

Setting up the components

First of all Python, MySQL and Rekall should be installed (along with Stunnel if you will be communicating data over the internet). Configuration files for Rekall and Stunnel are included in the ZIP package on the main page of this website. Please refer to the documentation on the individual packages for setting them up.

The Reports and Forms can either be stored in the database backend or on the client machine as part of the Rekall installation. The Forms and Reports are in an XML format and are installed onto the database backend along with the bare tables, when you load in the the database.sql file, which can be downloaded on the previous page. This is done with the following command in the MySQL monitor:

SOURCE database.sql

Alternatively the Rekall definition files from the database.zip file can be placed in the !Files local storage area within Rekall on the client machine.

If you need further assistance with this, then please e-mail: database@bitsnpieces.org.uk.