Access 2003 in a 2021 World???
-
@Dashrender while I agree, using a tiny dev company may cause the same issues that using a single developer would cause.
Businesses go out of business constantly, so it might make sense to use a well established company with a rather long history.
-
Even with an established software house you're entering in to a very committed relationship. You're relying on one company for modifications, fixes etc for years to come at an unspecified cost.
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
Sure, with typical ERP systems you will have customisations on top, either completely bespoke, or industry specific verticals. But that might only be 20% of the system, with 80% being standard. So moving to another ERP partner means the new partner only has to worry about the 20% of bespoke code, not a completely unknown system that is 100% bespoke.
And the reality is companies are simply not that unique. Many think they are, but the majority of unique business processes are not ones that add value but are a case of "we've always done it like this". Identifying unique processes that add genuine value, whilst standardising other processes, reduces the amount of customisation needed, reduces costs, and actually increases efficiency and business performance.
-
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
Even with an established software house you're entering in to a very committed relationship. You're relying on one company for modifications, fixes etc for years to come at an unspecified cost.
Like with any Microsoft Product?
-
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
That is why you'd have to use a well known, flexible and capable programming language. Hopefully as you're searching for a software development company, you'd also know to not look for someone who programs in Visual basic.
-
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
Sure, with typical ERP systems you will have customisations on top, either completely bespoke, or industry specific verticals. But that might only be 20% of the system, with 80% being standard. So moving to another ERP partner means the new partner only has to worry about the 20% of bespoke code, not a completely unknown system that is 100% bespoke.
I would honestly say the difference is even less, at least in my experience. With my prior example the business really only needed one custom report made (granted using Crystal Reports) to really make the software work for the business.
The hundreds of thousands the business previously invested was unable to do what a simple report from the existing database, albeit custom was able to do.
-
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
That is why you'd have to use a well known, flexible and capable programming language. Hopefully as you're searching for a software development company, you'd also know to not look for someone who programs in Visual basic.
This is a HUGE part of the problem. This is where being IT is critical - but it's unreasonable for the owner of a HVAC company to be expected to know anything about what programming languages are good ones, which ones will have longevity... so they have to hire it out - but then too - how do they know they've hired well?
Knowing what we know now - programming in Flash was horrible - yet tons of enterprises created countless things in Flash - and continue to use those things, refusing to spend to basically recreate them in something modern.
I'm guessing there's something about things like Flash that @scottalanmiller will tell us was obvious why we should never have used it - but then the question is - where there anything else at the time (late 90's early 2000's) that could do the job? and what situations do we see laid out in front of us today the present similar situations?
I suppose the next question I have, considering I have no answers, is - should we be ready to accept that we need to start over once every 20 or so years because as our technology marches forward it simply leaves old, what I'll call stop gap measures, behind?I think this warrants it's own thread and discussion.
-
Speaking of having to start over every x years - and completely off topic - homes, people often don't seem to be prepared for the maintenance that home require. New windows every 20 or less years seems pretty common and nessecary, just like most roofs need to be reshingled at least every 30 years, HVACs replaced every 20, etc. Yet time and time again, you see people completely unprepared for these massive expenses.
-
@Dashrender said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
That is why you'd have to use a well known, flexible and capable programming language. Hopefully as you're searching for a software development company, you'd also know to not look for someone who programs in Visual basic.
This is a HUGE part of the problem. This is where being IT is critical - but it's unreasonable for the owner of a HVAC company to be expected to know anything about what programming languages are good ones, which ones will have longevity... so they have to hire it out - but then too - how do they know they've hired well?
Knowing what we know now - programming in Flash was horrible - yet tons of enterprises created countless things in Flash - and continue to use those things, refusing to spend to basically recreate them in something modern.
I'm guessing there's something about things like Flash that @scottalanmiller will tell us was obvious why we should never have used it - but then the question is - where there anything else at the time (late 90's early 2000's) that could do the job? and what situations do we see laid out in front of us today the present similar situations?
I suppose the next question I have, considering I have no answers, is - should we be ready to accept that we need to start over once every 20 or so years because as our technology marches forward it simply leaves old, what I'll call stop gap measures, behind?I think this warrants it's own thread and discussion.
Speaking from experience with flash, it was the only language that let you easily manipulate media at the time. If you needed to play an mp3, it took a single line of flash code and 5 minutes if you had to look up options. Most other languages you had to write a full mp3 player.
Today, basically any modern programing language has that sort of thing built in.
-
@travisdh1 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Dashrender said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
That is why you'd have to use a well known, flexible and capable programming language. Hopefully as you're searching for a software development company, you'd also know to not look for someone who programs in Visual basic.
This is a HUGE part of the problem. This is where being IT is critical - but it's unreasonable for the owner of a HVAC company to be expected to know anything about what programming languages are good ones, which ones will have longevity... so they have to hire it out - but then too - how do they know they've hired well?
Knowing what we know now - programming in Flash was horrible - yet tons of enterprises created countless things in Flash - and continue to use those things, refusing to spend to basically recreate them in something modern.
I'm guessing there's something about things like Flash that @scottalanmiller will tell us was obvious why we should never have used it - but then the question is - where there anything else at the time (late 90's early 2000's) that could do the job? and what situations do we see laid out in front of us today the present similar situations?
I suppose the next question I have, considering I have no answers, is - should we be ready to accept that we need to start over once every 20 or so years because as our technology marches forward it simply leaves old, what I'll call stop gap measures, behind?I think this warrants it's own thread and discussion.
Speaking from experience with flash, it was the only language that let you easily manipulate media at the time. If you needed to play an mp3, it took a single line of flash code and 5 minutes if you had to look up options. Most other languages you had to write a full mp3 player.
Today, basically any modern programing language has that sort of thing built in.
So this leads us down (at least in the one example) the foreseen requirement to have to rebuild most things from scratch as newer better, supported solutions come along... but this is only one example.
-
@Dashrender said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@travisdh1 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Dashrender said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
That is why you'd have to use a well known, flexible and capable programming language. Hopefully as you're searching for a software development company, you'd also know to not look for someone who programs in Visual basic.
This is a HUGE part of the problem. This is where being IT is critical - but it's unreasonable for the owner of a HVAC company to be expected to know anything about what programming languages are good ones, which ones will have longevity... so they have to hire it out - but then too - how do they know they've hired well?
Knowing what we know now - programming in Flash was horrible - yet tons of enterprises created countless things in Flash - and continue to use those things, refusing to spend to basically recreate them in something modern.
I'm guessing there's something about things like Flash that @scottalanmiller will tell us was obvious why we should never have used it - but then the question is - where there anything else at the time (late 90's early 2000's) that could do the job? and what situations do we see laid out in front of us today the present similar situations?
I suppose the next question I have, considering I have no answers, is - should we be ready to accept that we need to start over once every 20 or so years because as our technology marches forward it simply leaves old, what I'll call stop gap measures, behind?I think this warrants it's own thread and discussion.
Speaking from experience with flash, it was the only language that let you easily manipulate media at the time. If you needed to play an mp3, it took a single line of flash code and 5 minutes if you had to look up options. Most other languages you had to write a full mp3 player.
Today, basically any modern programing language has that sort of thing built in.
So this leads us down (at least in the one example) the foreseen requirement to have to rebuild most things from scratch as newer better, supported solutions come along... but this is only one example.
Sure, but nothing about what the future holds prevents one from using the best solution today.
That I believe is where a lot of the issue comes in, just finding the best solution today to develop in.
-
And yes I know that best is relative to ones needs.
Access was the "best" at one point I'm sure.
-
It's one thing writing a completely bespoke system, but who is going to design this for you? Sitting down a Production Manager (for example) with a blank piece of paper and asking what he wants is a recipe for disaster. Even if they had any idea what they wanted. A Production Manager might roughly know what an MRP routine does, but very few could actually design one from the ground up. It's an extremely complicated algorithm.
-
@Carnival-Boy I agree, which is why most organizations would first look to purchase a stock system that meets most of the businesses needs, and then customize that 1-20% that they need for their business work flows.
Building a piece of software to work the way each and every organization wants is insane.
Imagine if Adobe Creative Cloud did this, nothing would be the same on any given piece of software.
-
Tryton
Use a Tryton partner as your developer. Something happens to that company you can use another one for modifications.The only trick is getting. A Business Analyst that understands the business and can communicate the requirements.
-
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
And yes I know that best is relative to ones needs.
Access was the "best" at one point I'm sure.
I'm willing to bet that's not true - not a lot.. maybe $100... lol pretty sure Access was never the best for anything.. other solutions while possibly more difficult could still likely be shown to be much better solutions.
-
@Dashrender Yeah I'm not going to really take that bet, its the argument that when Access was "King" there were few actual software packages that did what these company needed.
I'd be willing to bet that some developer saw all of these individual MS Access systems and said to themselves I'm going to make one that does all of that without the complexity and came up with Quickbooks.
LOL
-
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@Dashrender Yeah I'm not going to really take that bet, its the argument that when Access was "King" there were few actual software packages that did what these company needed.
Oh, but we know that's not true at all - it MIGHT be true to say - no one made "simple" end-user creatable software packages that were cheap and that companies were willing to buy, but that's light years away from the best solution for the job.
I know people who use TONS of xls sheets because it's what they learned first and never bothered to look for the right/better solution for their long term uses. There's also the likeliness that the company didn't want to spend tons of money on bespoke software or even a software package that could do it - both with high price tags... only caring about short term gains, not long term business.
-
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
I'd be willing to bet that some developer saw all of these individual MS Access systems and said to themselves I'm going to make one that does all of that without the complexity and came up with Quickbooks.
LOL
LOL agreed!
-
@Dashrender said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
@DustinB3403 said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
And yes I know that best is relative to ones needs.
Access was the "best" at one point I'm sure.
I'm willing to bet that's not true - not a lot.. maybe $100... lol pretty sure Access was never the best for anything.. other solutions while possibly more difficult could still likely be shown to be much better solutions.
It wasn't Access itself that was the thing. It was the JET database engine that Access used under the hood that made it popular.
Back in the 90's if you wanted a simple database in your application and you used something like Visual Basic 3.0 then the JET engine was the first option to consider because Microsoft bundled it with VB and it was free. That's how it gained a foothold.
The JET engine was very very far from the best or even good. It was common to corrupt the database and run tools to "repair" it. But it was available without any effort - today we know that is perhaps the most important "feature"...
If you wanted the best you'd connect your application to an Oracle db.
MS Access itself was never a serious tool that developers used for business applications. It's very limited so VB was the default choice in the MS ecosystem for these kinds of applications.
-
@Carnival-Boy said in Access 2003 in a 2021 World???:
At least with major ERP systems like Microsoft, Oracle or SAP you have a partner network to work with. So if you fall out with your partner, or they put up their fees unreasonably, or they go out of business, then you can simply move to another partner and carry on. That's much, much harder with bespoke software.
That's true, for sure. Unless the original vendor is the source of the high fees, goes out of business (unlikely with the ones you mentioned, but industry ones do all of the time) or if there aren't many partners (a problem we've run into.)
Even good partner fees are often around $250/hr. You can hire a lot of your own staff for that kind of money.
