OnSong DB Manager relates to OnSong, an excellent iOS app for managing your lyrics and chords. As they say:
OnSong replaces the mess of paper and binders with interactive chord charts and sheet music on your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch.
My motivation in creating this project was to enable me to easily see what songs I had played where, when and how often, and to make it easier for me to create new sets for venues that avoided repetition of songs that had been played in the recent past. I also wanted straightforward listings of songs, books and sets.
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OnSong DB Manager runs on the Microsoft Windows 10 / 11 operating system. It may work on earlier or later versions of the operating system, I have not tried it.
OnSong DB Manager requires an installed version of Microsoft Excel; the online version is not supported. 32-bit versions of Excel (Excel 95 - Excel 2007) and 64-bit versions of Excel (Excel 2010 onwards) should operate correctly. The 32-bit and 64-bit workbooks contain macros, which means that Excel will inherently distrust the workbooks and disable the macros. 64-bit versions will prompt you with a button to "Enable Content"; if you click on the button then it remembers the file and will not warn you again in the future. In 32-bit versions Macro Security should be set to "Medium" (or "Disable all macros with notification" in later versions); this will ensure that you are prompted whenever a workbook that contains macros is opened, and it will give you the choice of whether or not to enable macros. If you do not enable macros then the workbook cannot do its magic.
The cloud service, to which your OnSong backups are written, should automatically write the backup file to a folder on your PC. Dropbox and Google Drive, amongst others, have the ability to do this. I do not believe that OnSong's Cloud service is able to do this.
I recommend that you read the OnSong DB Manager.pdf file included in the zip file. This gives a more thorough explanation of how to run and get the best out of OnSong DB Manager. What is given below is just a TLDR.
Download OnSongDBManager_2v1.zip and unzip it into the folder of your choice. I recommend that you create a folder specifically for it (from hereon referred to as the OSDBM folder), e.g. C:\OnSongDBManager. N.B. Do NOT unzip into the folder where your backup files are stored.
In a text editor open a new file.
On the first line type the path to the folder to which your cloud service mirrors your backup files, e.g.
C:\Dropbox\OnSong BackupsChange the line near the top of the file that starts with SET CLOUDDIR= to reflect the path to which your cloud service mirrors your backup files, e.g.
Ensure that the file contains only one line and then save it as CLOUDDIR.txt in the OSDBM folder. Close the file.
Create a shortcut to the OSDBM.cmd file on your Desktop for easy access to it.
Run OSDBM.cmd by double clicking on the shortcut that you created; this will result in the Main Menu being displayed, as shown below.
NOTE: Before you are able to make an Excel workbook (menu options 1 or 2) or list issues with a database (menu option 6) you must extract an OnSong database (menu option 3 or 4) first.
Menu option 3 copies the most recent backup file from your cloud folder into the the OSDBM folder and extracts the database from it.
Menu option 4 extracts the database from the most recent backup file in the OSDBM folder.
Menu option 5 extracts all the song files from the most recent backup file in the OSDBM folder.
Menu option 6 check for issues with the extracted database file in the OSDBM folder.
Menu option 1 creates a 32-bit Microsoft Excel workbook and menu option 2 creates a 64-bit Microsoft Excel workbook that is populated with data from the extracted database file in the OSDBM folder. It will contain six worksheets, the last of which is named "Search" and is shown below.
Clicking on the Search button on the Search worksheet displays the Repertoire Search dialog, shown in below.
Repertoire Search is most effective if you follow the following guidelines:
You create a book that contains all the songs in your repertoire. If you are a member of more than one band then there should be a book that contains the repertoire for each band.
You create a folder for each venue, or if more than one of your bands play at the same venue then a folder for each venue + band, e.g. Mushroom Hall (Saltation) and Mushroom Hall (Solo).
You create sets that are allocated to the correct folder and given the correct date and time.
If you do this, and you are keen to create set lists that don't repeat songs too often, then your diligence will be rewarded.
Taking the example in the image above, on clicking on the Search button, a new Results worksheet will be created that lists all songs in the Saltation folder that have not been included in a set in the Derby Folk Festival folder since 1534hrs on 12 July 2022. Essentially, it filters out all the songs that this band has played there since the date and time selected. It saves a lot of time cross-checking whether or not a song has been played there too recently.
OnSong DB Manager always makes its own copy of your backup file so that your original backup file is never changed.
OnSong DB Manager never changes its own copy of your backup file, which means that you are free to delete this file when you are finished with it.
OnSong DB Manager never communicates with your iPad therefore it cannot have any effect on your OnSong app or its library.
7za.exe, the 7-Zip standalone console version is covered by the GNU LGPL, see License 7-Zip.txt in the OnSongDBManager_2v1.zip file.
sqlite3.exe, the SQLite command line shell program, is public domain, see the SQLite copyright page.