The Manual

Data Solutions for the Green Industry grew out of a desire to help those in the nursery and greenhouse industry take advantage of available technology and develop their own tools for any challenges or opportunities they might encounter. The hardest part with new technology is often knowing where and how to start, and although databases are nothing new, the idea of building one for yourself or your company may be. Hopefully, this manual can help clear these initial hurdles.

The manual is available as a .pdf file. This gives the user the options of viewing it on a screen or printing it, in whole or in part, in a format that best suits their needs. The first five chapters are available as a free sample.

There are two companion databases available for use with the manual. They are not necessary to have, because as you work through the manual, you will end up creating the exact same databases yourself. However, they are there if you need or want them. 

There is currently one other database available, the Plants database, and more are on the way. The long-term goal is to make available high-quality examples of what is possible with a database, including tracking inventory, recordkeeping and reporting, plant nutrition analysis, and more. 

As you browse this site, you will find that there are several databases and only one manual, but our goal is educational, and the manual is the foundation of that goal. Everything in the manual can be learned for free with enough searching on the internet, but that will take time. There are almost 25 years of trials, successes, failures, and learning condensed into this text, and our hope is that it puts the user on the right track quickly and firmly.