Client/Server query strategy

I need some opinions on how SQL front end tools should be used against an Oracle 7 database.

We're doing a data warehouse project to enable end users (not programmers) to do ad-hoc queries. A number of people in the I.S. department are suggesting that we select a query tool that allows us to do all of the sorting and data aggregation (sums, avgs, etc.) entirely on the client side. That is, if you want to summarize large amounts of data down to a dozen or so rows, perhaps dollar totals and counts by some code, that we download the entire set of pertinent detail rows to the PC client and let the client do all of the sorting and totaling.

Does this sound like an effective strategy to you? I'm new to client/server thinking but not new to I.S. or database programming. I don't think it is but find myself out on a limb all by myself on this one. That's why I'm looking for more opinions. It seems like a potential network bandwidth killer to me when you're talking about summarizing tables with millions of rows in this manner (and that's what we're talking about). Not to mention that I think it's going to drastically increase the overall time it takes to complete such queries.

Besides this, are there even any tools out there that can do this without custom programming? I know all the tools do the sorting part, but haven't seen any that do the
aggregation.

><> Chuck Hamilton <><
Received on Mon Mar 06 1995 - 15:30:02 CET