Recommend a simple local FLOSS database for beginners? (piefed.social)

submitted 2 weeks ago by klu9@piefed.social to c/linux4noobs@programming.dev

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Context

I've started a Fediverse watch party (#ReMonsterdon on Mastodon) & want to store & organize info about it (films shown; films scheduled to be shown; candidates for showing; dates; relevant links like streams, trailers, Wikipedia; images like film posters etc).

At the moment, I'm using a combination of stuff on my computer, i.e. a folder with text & image files, and a collection on NeoDB, a Fediverse media catalogue.

But I'd like a more all-in-one & organized/organizable file (easy to search, sort etc). A lot of people use a spreadsheet for that kind of thing. But I was under the impression that that's what databases are for.

I don't know much about either. I use spreadsheets very little and databases not at all (except NeoDB, I suppose).

Request

Is there a simple, local, FLOSS, GUI database, suitable for beginners, that I could use for this?

(I had a look at my installation of LibreOffice, but for some reason the options for creating a Base file are greyed out or missing).

(I am not yet ready to try self-hosting. So something that is local, preferably in a system package, .deb or .AppImage. My OS: Linux Mint 22.2 Xfce.)

Thanks in advance

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[-] LordMayor@piefed.social 7 points 2 weeks ago

There’s nothing wrong with using a spreadsheet for that purpose.

Sure, use a database if you think it’s going to grow very big, need complicated queries or will be the backend of a service. Or, you just want to learn about databases.

Libre Office will work with native flat files or other db backend. SQLite with a gui app is good for learning SQL.

[-] klu9@piefed.social 2 points 2 weeks ago

Thanks for the tips

this post was submitted on 17 May 2026

15 points (100.0% liked)

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