"BTW "run-of-the-mill laptop" is a meaningful performance spec. It can be reasonably assumed to mean something along the lines of a mid-tier corei3 or i5 with the integrated video card, 4GB of DDR3 RAM and a 5400 RPM 2.5" platter drive."

Under what circumstance is it safe to assume that the term "run-of-the-mill" in this context equates to a multi core 64bit CPU? You seem determined to validate the use of assumptions based on arbitrary phrases.

"Again, a reasonable and helpful person might answer: "- I used database module X in this and that manner for a somewhat similar project with a database about the same size and I saw lookup times between 0.1 sec and 0.3 sec on XYZ hardware out of the box. From what you describe, your lookups should be in the same ballpark." Or: "- If 20MB including the DB engine and the TK gui is reasonable for you, then yes. PAR::Packer should have no problem packing the DB module XXX, I've done it before. It can't pack DB module YYY, though, so don't use that if you need to pack the whole thing into an exe with PAR::Packer."

You keep providing pointless responses like this, yet not actually addressing any of the pertinant points raised in response to your posts. You have experience of pp, in the time it's taken you to post this you could have discovered the generated exe size for a basic script reading in Tk and several different database drivers (for comparison since you have yet to choose a database platform). In short, you could answer this yourself in a matter of minutes if you were actually concerned with the answer, rather than semantical arguments.