Access Capabilities (1 Viewer)

[khurram7x]

I've been posting questions recently in tables and reports forums on part of the project I'm working for. It basically is a project proposed by Costing and Planning department. I work for an Electrical contracting company in Oil and Gas industry.

Now company wants to develop a database where all the costing and planning information including man hour, project costs, etc will be save in each database separately. That database from each project will then combine and present a consolidated report in another database deployed in branch office. Further up in hierarchy, all information will be consolidated in a regional office database and then Central office, all distributed at different geographical locations. Obviously web databases will be used for this purpose at some stage. Later, PDA's could also be used to enter the information in database right from the field.

I've discussed with few database programmers and being told that Access is not a right tool to develop such kind of multi-level databases and is not that robust, plus not possible to use PDA's with Access DB or their implementation is too difficult in Access. Most of them highly suggested to use at least SQL Server with .NET to get the required functionality and use of PDA's. Others suggest that now there are better solutions and use Office 365 kind of cloud facilities, no need to install servers or create a database application, along with the power of new Excel features and Power BI that will make my life a way lot easier.

Now i'm in a really confused state right in the beginning of project and desperately looking for advice whether i should proceed with Access or shall I take on some other advice, which also will have its own learning curve unfortunately.

I really appreciate if you experienced guys put me in the right direction, and suggest if Access is really capable in my case.

Thanks in advance.

K

 

[Ranman256]

Access is perfect for this.
Consolidating all separate dbs would take some planning to collect it. But can be done.
Access is made for combining, reporting just like you described.
Ive made hundreds of dbs for users so they can just point and click to get what they want.

go for it.

 

[ButtonMoon]

Access is an application development tool but it also includes a database engine called Jet/ACE which stores data in MDB / ACCDB files. Jet/ACE would not be a wise choice for the kind of situation you describe. A SQL DBMS (such as SQL Server, Oracle, MariaDB for example) with a client-server architecture is much better suited to distributed, multi-location, multi-user, scenarios. The SQL DBMS products are far more robust than Jet/ACE, more secure and have much more powerful features built in that make them easier to use and support. I expect that is the basis of the advice you were getting: Don't use Jet/ACE.

You can use Access as the basis of your front-end application even when you use a SQL DBMS for the database. Access works very well with SQL DBMS databases. Access isn't really an option for web-based applications or applications on PDAs however, so you may have to consider using other technologies for those parts of your requirement.

 

[Galaxiom]

I would do this with a single database for the entire corporation on a database server with a web front end built in php or ASP.

This front end will run on anything with a web browser.

 

[khurram7x]

Access is made for combining, reporting just like you described.
Ive made hundreds of dbs for users so they can just point and click to get what they want.

Thanks, at least it cleared my mind from one angle.

]...Jet/ACE would not be a wise choice for the kind of situation you describe. A SQL DBMS (such as SQL Server, Oracle, MariaDB for example) with a client-server architecture is much better suited to distributed, multi-location, multi-user, scenarios...

This was database will sit at the central server, like on MS SQL platform and there will be no need to implement SQL Server at each office?? Can we use SQL Server as back end to Access, if yes, how difficult would it be?

You can use Access as the basis of your front-end application even when you use a SQL DBMS for the database... Access isn't really an option for web-based applications or applications on PDAs however, so you may have to consider using other technologies for those parts...

What technologies do you think shall i use for the front end?? I've unclear suggestion to use .NET.

I would do this with a single database for the entire corporation on a database server with a web front end built in php or ASP.
This front end will run on anything with a web browser.

Thanks, it is applicable to an extent in my case. Additionally, I've another suggestion that newer solutions like MS cloud things and PowerPivot, PowerQuery and Power BI type things are gaining much popularity in recent times and might completely take over Server based installations or Web based application in future. Are companies going to be completely server free? Possible to put some light on it?

Sorry, maybe I'm putting questions not related to Access directly, but i'm trying to make myself clear about the best places where to go with Access.

Thanks

 

[Galaxiom]

Access is perfect for this.

Many developers would disagree.

Access does not work well over slow connections such as WANs or Internet. Consolidating the data would be very cumbersome.

 

[Galaxiom]

Thanks, it is applicable to an extent in my case. Additionally, I've another suggestion that newer solutions like MS cloud things and PowerPivot, PowerQuery and Power BI type things are gaining much popularity in recent times and might completely take over Server based installations or Web based application in future. Are companies going to be completely server free? Possible to put some light on it?

I'm old school and a Cloud sceptic so I don't know about this stuff.