For keeping my kitchen knives in sharp order, I use something that was 
in
my grandmother's knife drawer.  It looks like this:

http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=old+kitchen+knife+sharpener&FORM=HD
RSC2#view=detail&id=72158B04E40738C0EA775D6B317B69B39990F879&selectedIndex=3">ht
tp://www.bing.com/images/search?q=old+kitchen+knife+sharpener&FORM=HDRSC2#view=d
etail&id=72158B04E40738C0EA775D6B317B69B39990F879&selectedIndex=3

I've heard people damn this devise, but a few swipes with it and my
kitchen knives just float through tomatoes like nobody's business.  No 
muss
no fuss.  A person can get all Rumpelstiltskin about sharpening knives,
but this has done the job on my knives (one for the past 40 years).

Mike in Sacto