Re: Oracle the System of Choice?

In article <34CCBB86.56D7_at_bedrockcomputers.demon.co.uk>, steve_at_bedrockcomputers.demon.co.uk said...
> Al Frick wrote:
> >
> > I am switching from Fospro for DOS to the Windows world. Most of my
> > clients need client/server. File/server no longer good enough.
> >
> > But what software to use?
> >
> > Oracle seems to have a huge market share, which immediately tells me
> > this is the one to choose. But I am worried about the complexity of
> > Oracle.
> >
> > Several people have recommended PowerBuilder in conjunction with
> > Oracle.
> > [snip]
>
> Powerbuilder is not your only choice and I would suggest that you look
> into some of the others before going down this route. Certainly a
> problem that I have seen, albeit secondhand, was that the required spec
> for the client machines (that is required to run at an acceptable speed
> not what it says on the box) seems to escalate with Powerbuilder. (That
> is not to say that some of the aternatives are not equally as guilty).
>
> With the type of customer that you are dealing with I would have thought
> telling them that they need to upgrade all there PCs is likly to lose
> you the contract!

Agreed.

> Some options to think about are the Developer 2000 set of tools from
> Oracle, Gupta SQL Windows, Borland Delphi.
>
> I do not have the experience to really recommend any of them but I would
> suggest that they are contenders.

Is there any particular reason that you didn't mention VB?

If it is strictly a data access app, PowerBuilder may be your fastest development route. No matter what you do you are going to have a learning curve to cover. If you go with something like VB you will leave you client with an application that has a much larger development base for maintenance and upgrades down the road.

I have not heard many good stories about Developer 2000, but they are also just that - stories. I have no first-hand experience with it.

Brad

 Bradley S. Murray       Princeton Computer Consulting  (609) 730-9100
 BradMurray(-at-)usa.net   Pennington, NJ 08534-3612     Fax: 730-0761
                            http://pcci.home.ml.org