Automating my collections has to be difficult.
Discover what over three hundred institutions already know; that our collections management software, Minaret, makes it easy to computerize your holdings. With our main menu and dozens of easy-to-use screens and reports, cataloging your collections is a breeze. Just choose a collection from the main menu and fill in the fields on the screen to get started. We have screens and reports for general museum collections, archives, books, maps, music, photographs (and other visual materials) and slides.

My needs are so unique, I need custom software.
Recognizing that every cultural repository is unique, Minaret is designed to adapt to your existing operations and procedures. You can easily change all of the screens, reports and field definitions supplied with Minaret. For example, you can modify your accession screens to look just like your existing forms. This approach gives you the best of both worlds; the quality, support and competitive cost of an "off the shelf" software package, combined with the flexibility and control of custom written programs. So why go to the considerable expense of reinventing the wheel when we can provide exactly what you need?

I don't have time to automate my collections.
The sooner you make a commitment to automation, the sooner you will increase your productivity and free yourself from the repetitive and mundane tasks that computers do so well. In addition to having instantaneous access to information on objects in your collection, your response to research requests will be faster and more thorough. Printed reports about your collections are produced with the same ease and speed.

Automation is an all or nothing proposition.
The prospect of cataloging your collections may be too daunting to contemplate. As with any project, you can break the task into smaller pieces. Many institutions using Minaret started with a single department or collection and added from there. This approach allows your to automate at your own pace.

Once I select a system, I'm locked into it.
We have done many things to protect your investment in automation. Minaret runs on standard operating systems and computers. This gives you more choices and better prices when you purchase a machine. You will also have access to the many products available on such widely used equipment.

As your collection databases grow, your data will become increasingly valuable because of the time spent creating it. Minaret insures that you can exchange your data with other institutions and database systems in order to protect your investment. This is done via standard ASCII and Library of Congress MARC data interchange. We use standard equipment, software and exchange formats to keep your options open.

PC's aren't powerful enough to handle my collections.
Minaret, running on a personal computer, can manage hundreds of thousands of objects. Computers have changed a lot in the past ten years. You can now do things on a PC that used to require a mainframe. Minaret has been optimized to provide fast queries and immediate access to individual records.

I can't afford to automate.
This is the biggest myth of all. Some people would have you believe that you will have to sell off your collections in order to computerize. Not only is our software easy to use, it is also easy on your budget.

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