Application Design

[Terry Roberts]

A stand-alone application I developed for Access 2000 is
now being used in several offices in my company.
Management would like to be able to access the application
remotely (management in Atlanta, MDB files in five
different cities). Although the company has a WAN,
attempting to access each database remotely is IMPOSSIBLY
slow. I've split the database (using Access 2K database
splitter), and reduced controls/lookups/queries as much as
possible.

I'm convinced that the application needs to be redesigned
as a true client-server app, using SQL in Access 2002. My
question is, would it be better to develop it as a web-
based application, or can I do an Access executable which
will tie back to the SQL server across the WAN? I would
prefer to do it as an Access application so I can employ
more controls & features, but am concerned about the speed
issue.

Recommendations requested. If anyone has a SQL client-
server design similar to the one I've described that I
could view in action to see performance for myself, that
would be great.

TIA,

Terry Roberts

 

[TC]

As you doubtless know, Access (really, Jet) performs all actual data
processing on the client - not the server. So it must grab all relevant data
from the server, over the network, down to the client. It can not say to the
server, "please do query XYZ then return just the results to me". So at the
end of the day, there is no way you will get acceptable performance over a
WAN, storing the data db on the server, with the code db the client(s).

However, some people report good sucess using a "terminal server" program
(such as Citrix? MS terminal Server?). In that configuration, the data >and
code< db's reside on the server, and the clients act as "dumb terminals" to
access the code db, on the server, via the "terminal server" program. Thus,
the only network traffic is keystrokes & screens, not great wads of data
traffic. You may wish to consider that option as an easier alternative to
proper client/server.

Bear in mind that I am commenting from general knowledge only. I have not
done any of this personally.

HTH,
TC