I'm trying to convince someone about the virtues of designing a proper
relational database with tables, relationships, referential integrity
etc. instead of dumping data into a flat-file Excel sheet. ....
This person doesn't know much about relational databases.
I am not sure that you necessarily have to:
Excel databases are fast to set up and easily corrected when mistakes are
found;
Excel does not have strong typing, so if you need a row number "124b" in
between 124 and 125 then it's easy;
Excel does a load of calculating as it goes, which is far more flexible
than an SQL query will ever be;
Excel displays a row-and-column view of the data which makes many naive
users happier than dropping everything into a "bucket of records";
Excel also has lots of simple user facilities (that's simple facilities
for users, not the other way round...) like automatic forms, query by
example, quick sorting, autofilter, and so on that are probably even
easier than their Access counterparts;
On the other hand, you could offer a primer in R theory, lots of practice
and experience in database and data semantics, requirements analysis,
data flow dynamics etc etc -- but how often is your person going to need
these skills afterwards?
The advantages of R are about resilience and integrity of data, and the
ability to guarantee the modelling in complex data environments. The DBMS
part gives you a sophisticated security model on top. In the end, most
databases are just lists of stuff and it hardly matters whether someone
is spelled P.A. James or PAJames or an unholy mixture. The people here
(including me) tend to use RDBMs because that's what we know: "to a man
with a hammer every problem looks like a nail". But to someone else, a
different tool altogether is often appropriate.
If you are going to justify spending this person's time and money, you
need to do it in terms of the requirements of his project. Is he going to
go bust/ to jail/ mad/ etc if he has a Spondiff without a valid
SpondiffSpecifier? If the answer is yes, then he needs a R database
designed (either by him or for him). If the answer is no, then there are
plenty of better or alternative approaches.
Just a thought....
Tim F