Re: Oracle DB via Access - Still C/S?

[Quoted] [Quoted] "Steve Jorgensen" <nospam_at_nospam.nospam> wrote in message [Quoted] [Quoted] news:rrqq4vkntcimrsuidvija6v3mcdjd0dd96_at_4ax.com...
> On Fri, 14 Feb 2003 18:09:02 -0330, Tim Marshall <Sabot_at_Spam.On>
> wrote:
>
> >Crossposted to comp.databases.ms-access and comp.databases.oracle.tools
> >
> >I do plenty of apps with Access as the application and Oracle as the
> >database using ODBC and Access SQL against linked Oracle tables as well
> >as Access pass through queries (using Oracle SQL against the ODBC DSN).
> >
> >Is such an arrangement still considered to be a client server
> >application? This question may belie my uncertainty about the exact
> >definitions of a client server application (what I believe most of the
> >Omnis/Oracle, Powerbuilder/Oracle I am familiar with are) versus a file
> >server app.
> >
> >Thanks in advance for any comments on this subject. I apologise for the
> >cross post, but felt the question was relevant to both groups.
>
> The conventional definition of C/S with regard to database
> applications refers to the fact that there is a database server
> process running on the request of a client application. Oracle
> vertainly is a database server! Therefore, using Access as a
> ffront-end to Oracle is unquestionably C/S.

I disagree. In a lot (lot more than I care to accept) of situations, if you're using linked tables, the brain-dead Jet engine decides that the server shouldn't do any processing and will drag *huge* amounts of data, kicking and screaming (to the chagrin of your network folks and DBA) across the wire -- essentially negating the entire C/S model.

If all data access is done via pass-thrus, then yeah, I'd say it's C/S.

[Quoted] If you've got a lot of linkage (linked tables) going on then, maybe it's C/S maybe not -- depending on what Jet decides to do with the queries

[Quoted] Just wait 'til you're hitting a big table with a couple of 100s of millions of records and Jet decides to go flakey. It will. Randomly. Most times it will be very smart about data access but sometimes it will change the query plan and do something stupid -- totally brain dead. If you've got millions of rows, and it decides to get stupid on ya, you're screwed.

[Quoted] Because of this, you'll want most (if not all) of your data access to be via pass-thrus, and even those should not contain any "raw" SQL, but should be calls into pre-compiled stored procs on the DB server. In the "old days" I switched to ODBCDirect for this kind of stuff, guaranteeing that Jet would be bypassed.

[Quoted] [Quoted] I actually skip pass-thru querydef objects completely and now do all data access via ADO in code.

[Quoted] Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love Access -- especially it's report writer -- it's just that the native Access database engine (Jet) is prone to go flakey on you and make you look bad. If you take appropriate precautions, it's the greatest thing since sliced bread!

• jwp