Re: General question: Oracle vs. "hand-written" database

a hand-written solution most likely will be slower and would have less features
oracle is far too complex to rebuild the functions in it.

on the other hand you need to know IF you need this speed and the features, that oracle offers.
and there is a BIG difference in the price. oracle is rather expansive, so i think that another solution would be a lot cheaper.

if i were you i would choose a way in the middle. other databases are a lot cheaper or for free and offer a lot of features and good speed
postgresql for example is for free.
and for sure it can easily handle the amounts of data that you described.

Mike Harlos wrote:

> Hello,
>
> I am the medical director for a palliative care program which is
> searching for a database that will handle about 1000 new patients per
> year, and be accessible over a network and over the internet so that
> those of us on call can pull up patient info and make entries.
>
> I am by no means a computer expert. I have put together a "temporary"
> database in Access on a stand-alone PC so that we can keep track of
> basic demographics, and produce reports regarding length of stay etc.
>
> Access is apparently not compliant with our province's privacy
> legislation, as it does not provide for detailed tracking of who made
> changes to what data at what time etc. I have been told that Oracle is
> compliant with these requirements, and I have been following this
> newsgroup to gain some understanding of its potential. I thought that
> we would be soon hiring a developer to put together an Oracle database
> for us.
>
> However, one of the quotes that we have relates to a database written
> in Basic, which on the surface seems to meet our needs.
>
> My question is:
>
> Is it conceivable that something written from the "ground-up" could
> compare with a database application built on a foundation such as
> Oracle? (This is where my naïveté no doubt shows). My (possibly
> invalid) assumption would be that while one may be able to write from
> scratch the means to store data, that the power of data retrieval,
> data integrity assurance, security/privacy, multiple simultaneous
> users, etc would be more reliable from an established product such as
> Oracle.
>
> My apologies if this is too general a question for this group; I
> didn't know quite where to ask it, and I value the opinions of those
> that participate here.
>
> Thank you,
>
> Sincerely,
>
> Mike Harlos
>
> --
> = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
> Mike Harlos MD, CCFP Email: mike_at_harlos.net
> Medical Director, Palliative Care Sub Program,
> Winnipeg Regional Health Authority
> Medical Director, St. Boniface Hospital Palliative Care
> Rm.A8024, 409 Tache Ave, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada R2H 2A6
> Ph:1-204-235-3929 Pager:1-204-932-6231 Fax:1-204-237-9162
> PGP Keys: DH/DSS- 0x8CD85BCE RSA- 0xBBDB40B1
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  Received on Tue Jun 26 2001 - 08:53:43 CDT