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Need to choose Db Platform- help!

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by mistergee

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I'm a newbie and while I have experience trouble-shooting, analyzing and fixing problems in already existing systems (hardware or software), I'm now faced with the new challenge- starting an inventory db from absolute scratch, and it has to have a twin db (which it would relate to) that keeps track of all our outside resources (suppliers, contractors, vendors, etc.) They both would be accessed by our sales staff who should be able to reserve our inventory (rental) and outside resources so thatno other sales person can promise them to a customer on the same dates. So, I'm guessing a third scheduling db is needed to tie the other two together... nevermind that there's talk of wanting barcoding for inventory.. anyone have suggestions as towhere to start?

3 replies

by bruceand

Unfortunately your lack of db knowledge is showing. What you describe is an everyday ho-hum db application and is easily handled by one database with multiple tables and forms.
BUT.... What OS are you using?, What type of network? Client-Server or Peer to Peer? Internet connections? How many products? How many vendors? How many customers? What are your security concerns? Barcoding is more of a hardware problem than a software problem.
How much can you afford to spend on a database development application?
All db development systems come with templates or sample applications that you can use to assemble basic db's. MS Access has a "Northwind Traders" sample that you could jury-rig to fit your requirements, and I'm sure Oracle or Informix has similar.

by szernik

When selecting a database platform the following consideration are important: amount of data and buget considerations. If you need to store large amounts of data with good reliable performance Microsoft's SQL Server, Sybase, Oracle are good and licensing is not too harsh. For smaller cheaper databases mSQL and mySQL are good alternatives. For small operations Microsoft Access is powerful and fairly easy to do basic operations in. Hope this helps in selecting a database system.

Shawn Zernik
www.shawnzernik.net

by spikeymike

Hmmm.... Personally, I would look around to see if this system already exists somewhere. Either as an open-source project or a commercial package. Unless you have the talent on staff already, developing this in-house is going to be costly. As fora database recommendation, I really like Sybase's Adaptive Server Anywhere (ASA).

Regards,
-Mike

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