Bento

The Bento public preview running on Leopard
Developer(s)	FileMaker Inc.
Stable release	4.0.5 / August 9, 2011; 6 months ago (2011-08-09)
Operating system	Mac OS X, iOS
Type	Database
License	Proprietary
Website	Official website

Bento is a database application for Mac OS X made by FileMaker Inc. Bento differs significantly from the company's flagship product, FileMaker Pro, in that it relies heavily on templates and integration with other applications. By default, Bento's data sources include Apple's Address Book and iCal applications, and it can modify them directly.

Compatibility

Bento is only compatible with Mac OS X 10.5 or later due to its reliance on features not available in previous versions of the operating system. Certain actions such as switching templates use Core Animation to animate the transition. It also includes integration with Time Machine for backing up and requires iCal 3.0 for live data editing.^[1]

Release schedule

A public preview was made available along with the initial product announcement on November 13, 2007.^[2] The final version was released on January 8, 2008.^[3]

Version history

Template sharing

A Bento Template is a pre-made library with all the forms necessary to catalog items within a certain context. With the release of Bento 2 on October 14, 2008, Bento users could import, export and share their templates. On June 16, 2009 Filemaker launched its own template sharing site^[4] where users can download a variety of templates as well as share their own. A few user created template sharing sites also exist:

• Bento Templates
• The BentoUsers Web Site

Upgrade controversy

On October 14, 2008, FileMaker released Bento 2.0, which contained bug fixes and new features, including integration with Apple's Mail. The new version does not offer upgrade pricing and costs the same as version 1. Many customers expressed their disappointment at the official Bento user forums,^[5] where FileMaker responded that they were using the "same pricing model" as other companies' products such as Apple's iWork and iLife suites.

Further, on November 25, FileMaker provided an official statement^[6] indicating that they would discontinue revisions and bug fixes for the version 1 product.

Given interest in a revision, this was neither a quick, nor an easy decision to come to.

Bento 1 received extensive beta testing, but like every software product, issues were discovered after shipment. We followed up with Bento 1.0.2 to address critical issues that had been discovered.

In addressing product issues discovered after 1.0.2 for the 2.0 release, we reworked the product in significant, and sometimes, architectural ways. Simply put, this means that there is no way to easily migrate the fixes in 2.0 backwards to 1.0. We would have to reengineer 1.0 until it effectively became 2.0. Doing so would have strongly delayed the 2.0.3 version of Bento, which we will be releasing as a free update for Bento 2.0.1/2.0.2 this week, and continued development of the Bento product line.

As of September 26, 2010, price for Bento 3 is $49 single, $99 (Family Pack of five licenses).^[7]

Competing software

• Alpha Five
• Borland Paradox
• DataEase
• dBase
• FileMaker Pro (formerly Claris Filemaker)
• Verside.org
• Kexi
• Lotus Approach
• NeoOffice
• OpenOffice.org Base
• Sun StarBase
• Foxpro (later acquired by Microsoft)
• SQLite
• Sybase PowerBuilder
• nuBuilder
• Omnis Studio

References

External links

• Official Bento website
• Official Bento Support Forums
• Bento Templates
• The BentoUsers Web Site