when do you outgrow access?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
  • Start date Start date
When you need
-- completely "lockdown" security on the data;
-- 50 or so users concurrently;
-- millions upon millions of records;
-- money is available to pay for much more expensive software and
developers
-- web access that is fully secure;

and a few other things potentially. Tell your IT department that it should
enjoy its great benefits for low costs.
 
Thanks for the "ammo"...other departments love to tell us "access hates to be
split" and other unsubstantiated horror stories (we are basically managing
2000 records a year with 4 people doing data entry ). I knew access could
handle it but being somewhat new I don't have the confidence to confront them
(did I mention there is no money to hire a programmer?)!

thanks so much!
Donna
 
ACCESS does not mind being split...in fact, it works even better that way
when you have multiple people accessing the data concurrently. We recommend
splitting a database as a regular process, even if only one user will use
the database.

Often, what people don't know...they criticize. They would rather assail the
unknown than learn about it.
--

Ken Snell
<MS ACCESS MVP>
 
Ken said:
Often, what people don't know...they criticize. They would rather assail the
unknown than learn about it.
Click to expand...

Yeah, what Ken said! It's amazing how many people are willing to run
down Access from a position of abject ignorance. Access certainly isn't
the database development tool for every situation. Nothing is. But
there are a huge range of data management scenarios where it is
unquestionably the most suitable tool available. Based on what you have
told us, Donna, about your project, it looks pretty certain to me that
Access is your best option.
 
Ken...
Noted your statement "millions upon millions of records"...

I am using Access 2000 and linked to a Paradox table with just over 500,000
records. I use Access to process the table to get all records that have
been added with a certain date...the date filed is indexed in Paradox (and
in Access when linked)...It is not a compliated query...but it takes almost
three hours to run...with a 2.8 gig processor... Maybe I'm doing something
wrong with the search...but I can't imagine trying to do the same with
"millions upon millions of records"... I'd have to start it on Friday before
leaving work and hope to have my data by the next Thursday!

JP
 
Ken...
Noted your statement "millions upon millions of records"...

I am using Access 2000 and linked to a Paradox table with just over 500,000
records. I use Access to process the table to get all records that have
been added with a certain date...the date filed is indexed in Paradox (and
in Access when linked)...It is not a compliated query...but it takes almost
three hours to run...with a 2.8 gig processor... Maybe I'm doing something
wrong with the search...but I can't imagine trying to do the same with
"millions upon millions of records"... I'd have to start it on Friday before
leaving work and hope to have my data by the next Thursday!
Click to expand...

If the data is STORED in Paradox, Access may not be able to
effectively use the Paradox indexes (depending on the details of the
query). Sometimes when you must work across platforms in this way,
it's advantageous to use a "Passthrough Query" (which in this case
would use native Paradox query language and return the hits to Access
as a recordset).

Using native JET (Access) tables, I've run multimillion row queries in
a small handful of seconds. Depending on the indexing and the
structure of the query, response can be effectively instant (for the
first records displayed). Of course a bad query (non indexed, using
functions on each row, etc.) can be very slow (as with any program).

John W. Vinson[MVP]
 
Thanks so much...appreciate the reponse...I'll have to check out my query
and do some "fine tuning"...

Jp
 
the date filed is indexed in Paradox (and
in Access when linked)
Click to expand...

Just note that an index *in Access* cannot be applied to a table *in
Paradox*. The index can only exist in the database (and software)
where the table is stored.

John W. Vinson[MVP]
 
I'm GUESSING that the date format in Paradox is different
from that in Access, and Access is bringing the data into
Access to do the date conversion, rather than asking Paradox
to select the records. If so, you may be able to get an
immediate speed up by querying using a native Paradox format
rather than a Jet/VBA date. For example, in Access (using
mdb tables), this is faster:
select * from tbl where dat > 10305
than this:
select * from tbl where dat > #03/18/1928#
because the numeric format is closer to the native format.

(david)
 
i just got my new job for the summer and the upcoming year. We have been
using an access based system to take online applications for students who
want to enroll in our international programs going overseas every summer.
Apparently, they have been having some difficulties with the current system
such as not capturing some of the applications and crashing when multiple
users were trying to enter new data, etc... I did not myself see it work as
the programs are over now, but the director of IT suggested to swithiching to
Oracle, in fact the database is already done. we have probably 300 students
applying every year and we have reports generated for the program
coordinator. I find it hard to believe that Access could not handle the
load.... Do we really need Oracle?
 
.... We have been using an access based
system to take online applications for . . .
we have probably 300 students
applying every year and we have reports
generated for the program coordinator. I
find it hard to believe that Access could
not handle the load.... Do we really need
Oracle?
Click to expand...

Access could, in all probability, handle a load much greater than 300
students per year. On the other hand, a particular database implemented in
Access may not and that, apparently, was the case. You can speculate that it
might have been more cost-effective to get a knowledgeable Access person to
correct the problems in the Access database. If you do, I suggest you not
bandy that opinion about in your workplace, because, in the real world, it
is likely to get back to the Director and questioning the judgement of your
Director of IT is almost NEVER a career-enhancing experience.

Larry Linson
Microsoft Access MVP
 
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