Viewing contents of a MySQL database

silverside

I am doing some scientific simulations and storing the results in a MySQL database.
I am writing to the database via ODBC. The database is quite simple (4 tables).

Now I want to analyse my results.

My original plan was
Create a view of the data in MySQL
Use Excel to use this view as an ODBC datasource
Plot the data

BUT
Views arent supported in MySQL.

So what should I do? Convert everything to SQL Server ( I see there is a free beta version of SQL Server 2005 lite available)?

Is there a better alternative?

Bear in mind that I want something
Free
Simple to use
Database performance is not really an issue; This is not and never will be a production system.

Thanks

Ivan Dunaev

write simple app, which will store result of your SQL-query into csv-file
then open it with excel

silverside

Thanks

I realised i can just create a dummy table instead of a view.
I tried installing SqlServer 2005 but couldnt find any visual management tools for it; I will stick to MySQL for the moment.