Offline Client

  • Thread starter Thread starter John
  • Start date Start date
John said:
Hi

I need to develop an app in vb 2005 which can work in both offline and
online modes and will be running on client laptops. I have listened
to the following web cast;

http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/W...&EventCategory=3&culture=en-US&CountryCode=US

What I need to know is, do the laptops need to have a local version
of sql server (mobile, express etc.) to accomplish the offline mode?

Thanks

Regards
Click to expand...

You can use Microsoft SQL Server 2005 Express for the clients. That
version of SQL Server is free.
 
John,

It depends on what you want to be able to do in offline mode.

1. Are you planning on using SQL-Server merge replication to subscribe for
the data so that its easy to offline and then merge any changes later?
Note: this may involve a large investment in time to get it right.

2. Are you planning on keeping some data in a local database and still
support editing? MSDE or the upcoming SQL-Server Express might be the
solution here. Note: there are some catches to using MSDE

3. Are you planning on keeping some data in local storage, but only require
read-only access. Depending on the amount of data, MSDE or SQL-Server
Express might be overkill. For small amounts of data you might consider
storing the data in Access or even persisting the a DataSet to XML and using
something like the QueryADataSet assembly I've been developing for providing
query capability while offline.

Depsite Microsoft's best intentions, MSDE and/or SQL-Server Express edition
aren't always the best solution to a problem.

Hope this helps
Adrian Moore
http://www.queryadataset.com
 
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