Many people want to convert from SharkWare, but there has been no easy way to do it, without retyping the many details.
As reported on SharkWare.Com, as of March 31, 2002 technical support for SharkWare has been discontinued.
From SharkWare.Com"Sharkware software is no longer sold by
Multiactive To upgrade Sharkware software to Maximizer, |
Multiactive bought SharkWare from CogniTech and its founder, Harvey McKay, author of "How to Swim With the Sharks, Without Being Eaten Alive." His books and seminars were highly successful, but his contact management software now sleeps with the fishes.
Sharkware went "belly up" leaving thousands of dedicated users dead in the water. Sharkware can't swim in Windows XP.
Sharkware received some fairly good reviews in its day, for its user friendliness. It was an early user of the Sybase/Microsoft SQL data format. It had Opportunities, Campaign Management, and an Internet Lead Utility built in. But it could not get the market share and acceptance of its competitors such as Maximizer.
We can take your SharkWare database and convert it into a Maximizer database
Send us your SHARK.DB, and we'll send you back the necessary .MAX files
We have a lot of experience doing it, to make it come out right.
Maximizer's link: SharkWare to Maximizer Conversion
Although similar, Maximizer and Sharkware do not share all the same features. The following lists what Sharkware data is converted and where it is saved in Maximizer.
Data in SharkWare |
Converts to this in Maximizer |
All contacts | individual records |
Nickname field | User-defined field (UDF) named Nickname |
Middle name field | First initial is saved in the Middle Initial field. |
Complete name | Placed in it's own UDF |
Company records | company records |
Contacts associated with a company | company contacts |
Addresses | addresses |
Phone numbers (first 4) | phone fields 1-4 |
Phone numbers (Email,Internet) | Email UDF |
Phone numbers (>5) | UDF for each phone number |
Custom Fields | UDF for each custom field |
Histories | Notes |
Mackay Profiles Q&As | Notes |
Bookmarks (first Bookmark) | Web UDF |
Bookmarks (after the first Bookmark) | Notes |
ToDos | Hotlist |
Phone Calls | Hotlist |
Appointments | Appointments |
Notes | Notes |
Groups | creates a table UDF |
Users (Network Only) | Users |
Workgroups (Network Only) | User Groups |
The following information gives important details that you need to know before converting data.
· Sharkware Address Lines 2 and 3 are converted into Address Line 2 in Maximizer. Sharkware's address line fields accept up to 40 characters and Maximizer's Address lines accept only 30 characters, so if Sharkware's Address Line 2 and 3 contains more than 30 characters, the data is truncated.
· Sharkware phone number fields allow 40 characters and Maximizer accepts 21 characters; after 21 charcters the phone number is placed in a user-defined field.
· A Sharkware Parent Company is converted into a Maximizer user-defined field. (Sharkware 4.0 only)
· A Sharkware Primary Contact is converted into a Maximizer user-defined field. (Sharkware 4.0 only)
· Maximizer only has an activity description field but not an activity note field. Sharkware's activity Description and Note must be converted into the Maximizer Activity Description field. The Sharkware Activity description and notes are truncated after 129 characters.
· All Sharkware Notes, Histories, Bookmarks and Profiles are saved in blocks of 9,200 characters; so if you have a Sharkware Note, History, Bookmark or Profile that contains more than 9,200 characters, the first 9,200 characters are converted and saved in one comment and the remainder is saved in another comment - all in increments of 9,200 characters or less.
· All Sharkware Notes, Histories, Bookmarks and Profiles are saved in the Notes section in Maximizer ordered by date.
· The Sharkware Category and Keywords fields do not convert to Maximizer.
· Sharkware's pop-up windows do not convert to Maximizer.
· If the Sharkware database has the same custom field name in different custom field sets, both custom fields are converted however a .# is placed after the custom field name to distinguish between the two custom fields. For example, if you have a Birthday custom field in two different Sharkware custom field sets, then Maximizer will have two user-defined fields, one named Birthday and one named Birthday.1.
· A Sharkware custom field with a field type as dollar is converted to numeric in Maximizer.
· A Sharkware custom field defined as numeric will only convert a string of numbers 15 characters or less.
· A Sharkware custom field defined as contact is converted to an alphanumeric user-defined field in Maximizer.
· Any Sharkware custom field name that contains a comma (,), the comma is converted to a space.
· Sharkware custom field set names are not converted.
· No Sharkware Sales Advantage data is converted.
· No Sharkware Campaign Manager data is converted.
· No Sharkware OLE or embedded objects are converted.
· Sharkware Recurring Activities do not convert; however the activities themselves do convert. For example, if you have a recurring activity for a birthday to appear for the next ten years in your Sharkware calendar, an activity for the birthday is created in Maximizer for each of those ten years but you do not have the option to edit globally the activity - you must edit each of the activities individually.
· No Sharkware drop-down lists are converted.
· (SHARKWARE NETWORK ONLY) The Sharkware UserID field is converted into the Maximizer UserID field. The Maximizer UsedID field accepts only 9 characters; after 9 charcters the UserID is truncated.
· (SHARKWARE NETWORK ONLY) The SYSADMIN user in Sharkware is converted to the MASTER user in Maximizer.
· (SHARKWARE NETWORK ONLY) Sharkware user's passwords do not convert into Maximizer. In Maximizer the default password for the MASTER user is CONTROL. There are no default passwords for all other converted Sharkware Users.
· (SHARKWARE NETWORK ONLY) Sharkware Workgroups are converted into Maximizer User Groups. The Maximizer Group Name field accepts only 37 characters; after 37 characters the Sharkware Workgroup name is truncated.
· (SHARKWARE NETWORK ONLY) While Sharkware Users and Workgroups are converted into Maximizer their relationships do not convert. These relationships must be manually set up in Maximizer once the conversion has completed. To help re-create these relationships the conversion program creates a text file in the Sharkware root directory (usually C:\SHARK) called SWADMN##.TXT which contains information on Sharkware Users and Workgroups. For information on recreating these relationships in Maximizer, please see http://www.sharkware.com/maupgradenetaddnotes.html