Considering FileMaker or Access for a Starter Database
-
The new APEX looks interesting. If you click get started you can do a hosted demo. Looks like you can do desktop apps, mobile, and web.
Eh I think the differences are just the layouts of the apps, but it looks easier than the old one.
-
And here's the resident Access fanboy to have his say. I don't know why people have such a downer about it. There's certainly a lot of misinformation out there. I suggest people read this wiki https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Access and get educated.
People seem to assume Access will only work with Access databases (Jet), when it works brilliantly with other databases, especially SQL server but I've written apps based on Oracle. I mostly use it with SQL Server these days. Whatever you use, the database should reside on a server not a desktop.
And Access runtime is free. So you can develop multi users solutions using Access runtime and SQL Server express for practically free.
And people talk about web apps. Access is designed to produce web apps, particularly with Sharepoint. Think of it more as an alternative to Visual Studio.
I thing the haters either have hardly used Access or haven't used it since the nineties.
It's awesome and keeps getting better with each new release.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
People seem to assume Access will only work with Access databases (Jet), when it works brilliantly with other databases, especially SQL server but I've written apps based on Oracle. I mostly use it with SQL Server these days. Whatever you use, the database should reside on a server not a desktop.
I'm very aware that it talks to SQL Server, that's the only way that I would ever consider using it, but was unaware that it works with other options. Will it talk to the big two: MariaDB and PostgreSQL or at least Firebird?
The assumption is that Access would be used this way, the problem with it is the client/server model. That's 1990s and pretty horrible. I know that you can put Access onto SQL Server and Sharepoint Enterprise for a full modern app, but the cost is incredibly high.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
And Access runtime is free. So you can develop multi users solutions using Access runtime and SQL Server express for practically free.
The runtime is free? Is that true on iOS devices too (a requirement for the client in question.) What about on Linux? Can we "access" it from anywhere?
SQL Server Express is free... except for the Windows Server license cost which would be required for even a tiny company and means that the cost shoots up by about $700. Not epic, but for a ten person company, not trivial either. But if you can use PostgreSQL, that would solve that piece.
-
@Carnival-Boy said:
And people talk about web apps. Access is designed to produce web apps, particularly with Sharepoint. Think of it more as an alternative to Visual Studio.
We've done this, although to be honest the results were horrific. SharePoint and Access were so slow together, it was painful to use. Not sure if we were missing something but it didn't seen to use WebSockets or anything modern and the response times from SP on SQL were rough.
Can you do with with anything other than SharePoint Enterprise? When we looked at it, it was an enterprise only feature. Which you get with Office 365 E3, which we have and that's how we got it, but for a small business without O365, I feel like the cost is out of reach.
-
Someone on the thread mentioned Zoho Creator. It looks interesting, but looking into the pricing model, it doesn't look interesting at all.
-
@scottalanmiller said:
Someone on the thread mentioned Zoho Creator. It looks interesting, but looking into the pricing model, it doesn't look interesting at all.
Ya I think really the only thing they have that's truly appealing is the Email. It's free for 10 people (plus like 15 more with referrals) and only about $2.50 (something around there) for paid accounts.
However, they still don't have desktop exchange support, only EAS. I use the web interface but it's still kind of crazy because you can't use any calendar apps built for desktop.
-
That Zoho product is NOT cheap. Saw your post, $5-$15/user each month. That adds up really quickly. That's well into custom, enterprise app prices if you get any number of users. Paying $15/mo for each user when you have to make the app yourself doesn't make sense. You could be paying for something already built at those prices.
-
So the place I interviewed with yesterday is a big Oracle shop. I was surprised to hear they use APEX for some of their process improvement and internal web app use. I thought that was interesting, and the interviewer thought it was interesting that I've used it before.
-
@scottalanmiller said:
@Carnival-Boy said:
People seem to assume Access will only work with Access databases (Jet), when it works brilliantly with other databases, especially SQL server but I've written apps based on Oracle. I mostly use it with SQL Server these days. Whatever you use, the database should reside on a server not a desktop.
I'm very aware that it talks to SQL Server, that's the only way that I would ever consider using it, but was unaware that it works with other options. Will it talk to the big two: MariaDB and PostgreSQL or at least Firebird?
It's called ODBC.
I used Access to connect to my AS/400's DB2 server. As long as ODBC is presented to the client, it works just fine.
-
@scottalanmiller said:
@Carnival-Boy said:
And Access runtime is free. So you can develop multi users solutions using Access runtime and SQL Server express for practically free.
The runtime is free? Is that true on iOS devices too (a requirement for the client in question.) What about on Linux? Can we "access" it from anywhere?
2013+ offers some fun stuff, but in a sense, no, it's not a "web" application. You can use Access, and an ACCDB, as a backend for design and the DB for IIS. I believe Apache can do it as well, but haven't bothered trying nor would it be really worth it other than a "look what I can do" thing.
SQL Server Express is free... except for the Windows Server license cost which would be required for even a tiny company and means that the cost shoots up by about $700. Not epic, but for a ten person company, not trivial either. But if you can use PostgreSQL, that would solve that piece.
SQL Server runs on any version of Windows. I use Developer on Windows 8. I've used Standard on XP. It's not a perfect solution, but if you need to get some info into standard format of SQL and don't have interwebs access, it's great.
-
@PSX_Defector said:
SQL Server runs on any version of Windows. I use Developer on Windows 8. I've used Standard on XP. It's not a perfect solution, but if you need to get some info into standard format of SQL and don't have interwebs access, it's great.
The OP has an office too big to be used that way though for licensing reasons.
-
@scottalanmiller said:
@PSX_Defector said:
SQL Server runs on any version of Windows. I use Developer on Windows 8. I've used Standard on XP. It's not a perfect solution, but if you need to get some info into standard format of SQL and don't have interwebs access, it's great.
The OP has an office too big to be used that way though for licensing reasons.
Just pointing out that Windows Server is not a requirement for SQL Server.
There is always the use of Azure's hosted DB. Again, simple, easy, ODBC compliant, uses standard SQL Server tools to modify and access. It's got some quirks, like I couldn't use hMailServer on it without some major modification of the schema, but otherwise it's plenty easy for quick and easy DB deployment.
Given the "need" for iOS "access", seems stupid not to put it in a hosted solution. Licenses are then just a line item on the invoice.
-
What is the pricing structure for MongoDB?
-
@BRRABill said:
What is the pricing structure for MongoDB?
There is a starter package for free. Then you can upgrade to the enterprise package for free. Then if you need HA clustering or global redundancy, that's an extra free.
Did I mention, it's free?
-
@scottalanmiller said:
@BRRABill said:
What is the pricing structure for MongoDB?
There is a starter package for free. Then you can upgrade to the enterprise package for free. Then if you need HA clustering or global redundancy, that's an extra free.
Did I mention, it's free?
I was a little confused by the wording on their website.
I thought it was free, but it was worded strange.
Like you can download it for free for evaluation and development.
That's like saying you can take the car for a free test drive and cross country trip.
-
@BRRABill said:
@scottalanmiller said:
@BRRABill said:
What is the pricing structure for MongoDB?
There is a starter package for free. Then you can upgrade to the enterprise package for free. Then if you need HA clustering or global redundancy, that's an extra free.
Did I mention, it's free?
I was a little confused by the wording on their website.
I thought it was free, but it was worded strange.
Like you can download it for free for evaluation and development.
That's like saying you can take the car for a free test drive and cross country trip.
Cloud Manager is not free, but you can get a trial for eval and development, maybe that is what you saw?
-
This is the important bit that tells you that it is truly free and protected free:
"MongoDB is covered under the GNU AGPL v3.0 license."
-
@scottalanmiller said:
Cloud Manager is not free, but you can get a trial for eval and development, maybe that is what you saw?
This is the page I was looking at:
https://www.mongodb.com/lp/download/mongodb-enterprise -
@BRRABill said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Cloud Manager is not free, but you can get a trial for eval and development, maybe that is what you saw?
This is the page I was looking at:
https://www.mongodb.com/lp/download/mongodb-enterpriseThat's not even the right website for MongoDB!! They are a .org.
