When ODB opens, you see the 'control center' for the database, known as the Main Menu. The buttons on the main menu are as follows: New, New Payment, Edit, Clone, Advanced Search, View Payments, Copy Emails, Import/Export, Print, and Mass Action.

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We recommend that you try all the buttons visible on this screen in order to get a feel for the program. Most functions are very straightforward. If you hold the mouse pointer on top of a field or box or button for a second or two, some help text (tool tip) usually appears explaining what that item is for. Features that do not apply to what is currently selected on the screen will always be disabled. Operations that delete information will always ask you to confirm, so it is hard to mess things up!

Initially you will only have two options: adding an entry to your database, or importing information from somewhere else. Try adding someone! Just click the New button, then type the person's name, address, phone number, email address, etc., using the Tab key or the mouse to navigate.

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If you are unsure which information should be entered into which field, hold the mouse cursor over the field name and it will display a tool tip with a description of the field.

Tip: Keep in mind that many fields are case- sensitive. If you do not capitalize names, ODB will not do it for you.

When you are done entering the information, click the Save Changes button to save it permanently. Now you have a database with one entry. An entry, in database lingo, is referred to as a 'record'; after you have added five people to the database, the database will have five records.

Searching. Once you have entered at least one record, you can try the search function. Enter the first two or three letters of a person's last name in the search box near the top of the Main Menu, and click the Search button or press the Enter key. You can also search by entering a comma followed by the first few letters of someone's first name. This feature is very important when you have thousands of people in your database; there might be 50 people with the last name of "Smith" and 25 people with the first name "Betty." All you have to do is type "sm,bet" and press Enter on your keyboard and you will most likely find Betty Smith. If you leave the box blank and press Search, ODB will retrieve all of the records in your database.

You will notice that when searching the list of people you can type a 5-digit ZIP code to find all people in that ZIP code. You can also use any piece of an email address (that includes a dot or @ sign, i.e. "@aol" or "aol.com") to search for people (or groups) with a specific kind of email address. You can even search by phone number, which allows you to identify calls on your phone bill - provided your phone numbers are entered in a XXX-XXXX or XXX-XXX-XXXX format.

More Search Options. If you right-click the Search button, or click the small arrow beside the Search button, a menu pops up. It provides you with several additional options. The first one lets you select all records in the database. You can also search in the first two lines of the address for what you typed in the search box. This is useful when a spouse or organization name is entered on Line 2 of someone's address.

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The other two options allow you to set ODB to automatically open the "new payment" or "edit record" screen, if only one record is found in the search. Those screens will not automatically open if more than one record is found. This option is invaluable if you are entering a large number of donations: you can reduce the number of screens you navigate to add a gift.

Previewing Records. Once you have found some records as described above, use the mouse to highlight a single record. This will cause the address, phone, and email information to be displayed in a "preview pane" found at the bottom of the screen.

If more than one record has been found, you can then use the arrow keys, or the Page Up and Page Down keys, to navigate through the list (which will be sorted alphabetically by first name). Initially, the preview pane shows only basic information. To expand it and see more, click the Show Details button in the upper right-hand corner of the Main Menu screen. To make the entire window larger, try clicking and dragging the edge of the window.

When one or more records are found by a search, the Print, Copy Emails, Mass Action and Import/Export buttons are enabled. When you select a single record, the Edit, Clone, and View Payment buttons will also be enabled (though donation history at this time does not apply to groups).

The Clone button is pretty self-explanatory: you can use it to create a new person or group that is almost identical to the person or group now selected. If Anna Jones is already in your database and her housemate signs up at an event, you can enter the housemate more quickly by finding Anna and then clicking on the Clone button when her name is selected. This will create a fictitious person named Cloned Jones with all of Anna's basic contact information. Just change the name, email, etc. and save the new record. This feature can save a lot of time, for instance, when you need to enter a second contact at an organization or in a household.