Application development Advise

[Beth Poka]

Hi All,

I need to build a simple inventory record keeping database which is used by many people within my company. What tools should I be using to develop it? VB, Lotus Notes, SQL Server, MS Access......? Combination of tools? Why would one tool over the other?

Interesting to find out.

Thanks in Advance
Beth

[makai]

all you need is vb since you can make a whole access DB from there and probably have better control over custom inputting, calculations, reporting, and printing

a DB is frequently used as the backend data tier rather than generic files because it is easier to add a whole new dimension (like a field) to your data painlessly

you could probably do an inventory in Access alone without VB if desired

[cjlindstrom]

If your app is an inhouse type app there is no faster way to create a database app than MS Access. MS Access probably has the best report writer on the market. App development time is probably 1/4 of the time a similar app would take in VB. If users don't have MS access installed you can use the runtime version of msaccess.

That being said if you need very fancy user interface components or a more compact runtime environment then VB is your ticket.

As for actual data storage if you are under about 10 concurent users MSAccess will do nicely. If you need more then you will want to look to a client server database such as MS SQL Server, Oracle, etc.

Craig

[Cakkie]

If the application has to be used by several users, and the data gets a bit large, Access will fail bigtime to do the jobs. You will have lowsy performance, strange behaviours and eventually unpredictable results.
If you want something of an application, you will need to go for SQL server in combination with VB. SQL server is one of the most powerfull database servers around (THE most powerfull for windows platform). Of course, it comes with a price. First of all, the price from SQL server, second of all, time spent in programming. Programming agains SQL Server is easy, it's just using ADO, however, there are no tools (ok, there are some) to speed up development. You will need to write all the code yourself, which increases the chances on errors (and eventually corrupt data).
What you choose depends on the situation, but if you need power, you have quite some data, and have the budget, I can assure you that SQL will be something you will not regret.

Tom Cannaerts
slisse@planetinternet.be

Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the universe is winning -- Rich Cook

[Andrew_Fryer]

Hello,

I would recommend not using Access. We have built a large application using this and it has got to the point where the program generates seemingly random errors which cause hours of frustration. It appears to be some sort of memory problem, but we cannot locate it's source.

Andrew