Yes. That software doesn't run under, say, Linux or NetBSD or whatever. Unless maybe it turns out to run under WINE.
Most people, lets be fair, who use computers already own a windows license. Including it in the cost isn't fair. You might not. But heck, I own one and I'm mainly a Mac user. I still have windows installed (mostly for playing Train Simulator, but whatever.)
Joel, a database like that would be a hellacious undertaking. I volunteer YOU for the project.
But compiling vast quantities of data like that seems to be the sort of thing that Green Maned Lion would enjoy more than I would.
And having raw data that could help us understand where trains might be able to go in the future somehow strikes me as more exciting than understanding exactly what happened to the Heritage fleet.
To each their own, Joel. I enjoy history and technical stuff. Also, I enjoy looking at a top down view of rail cars and wondering why the women's room in some of them, when viewed from the top down, looks surprisingly similar in general shape to a camel toe. (and I'm not refering to ungulates, neither!) (Swear to god, if you want I'll send you a copy of the diagram!)
But seriously, my current massive data accumulation and processing project is taking almost all of my time, and it seems, more than all of my energy. I'm doing this project, though, mostly for my own interest. I'm creating a book from it mainly because, once I do all this work, it seems a pity not to a) distribute the results, and B) possibly get paid a bit for the effort. But after sitting around asking myself, "What happened to this kind of car?" "What different types of cars existed?" and "Where are they now?" I ended up deciding that if I wanted a comprehensive answer to that question, I needed to find it myself.
If you want a coherent set of information on something that interests you, especially when the subject is a bit obscure, sometimes you have to create that yourself, man.