Should I be developing my own database at all?

[alon.gordon]

Dear Group,

I would call myself a moderate user of Microsoft access. I am fairly
confident of my ability to design and implement an effective database
for our company. However my concern is whether I should at all?

Our company manufactures custom made shower doors. As with any
business that offers customization to its customer's loose threads
need to be constantly tied up. A perfect job might take 3 weeks and
collect a mere handful of important numbers along the way (i.e.
purchase orders, invoice numbers, installation dates etc.). However, a
complicated job that's gone wrong way require remedial purchases
charged out to various parties; threads of discussion to co-ordinate
participants or relay technical data; numerous scheduled site events
to rectify on site issues etc.

Managing such 'loose threads' over 100s of jobs clearly requires a
neat and well organized database. If I start from scratch, would I be
wasting time reinventing the wheel? We are averse to spending the kind
of money that it would require to acquire SAP or a similar product. Is
there anything on the market that's got a lower entry level? Maybe
there is open source software that I can adapt?

Would really appreciate any thoughts on the matter, I apologize in
advance if I have chosen the wrong group to post this question to.

Regards

Alon

 

[DL]

If you are comfortable in Access have a look here for sometips/ideas
http://www.databaseanswers.org/data_models/index.htm

 

[Alon]

If you are comfortable in Access have a look here for sometips/ideashttp://www.databaseanswers.org/data_models/index.htm










- Show quoted text -

Thanks, great resource will definitely take a closer look

 

[Alon]

The phrase that immediately came to mind upon reading your post was "mare's
nest!" I'm very doubtful that you're going to find a template/sample db that
will suit your needs. Most of the templates/sample dbs are for "very" common
task; things like lending libraries, club membership/dues collecting, sports
league records keeping and so forth, all of which are relatively simple to
develop.. Databases developed for business models as complicated as yours
appears to be tend to be quite complicated, take a good deal of time, effort
and money, and so they are seldom placed in the public domain. Having said
that, you might find a application out there, maybe even an Access app, that
has been designed specifically for your industry and for sale for a much more
modest sum than SAP. I'd look in the classified/ad section of your trade
journals. You say that you're confident that you can develop a db for this
purpose, but you don't say *why* you're confident. From the seeming
complexity here, unless you have actually done this a number of times before,
it's going to be five times harder than you think and take ten times longer
to do!

Good Luck!

Linq

P.S. You may very well get a response from a self proclaimed consultant
named Steve of PC DataSheet. Ignore his offers of help and any advice he
gives. He's a rip-off artist who cruises this site looking for victims and
his advice runs the gamut from being so so to being suff sci-fi movies are
made of!

--
There's ALWAYS more than one way to skin a cat!

Answers/posts based on Access 2000

http://www.accessmonster.com/Uwe/Forums.aspx/access/200708/1

Thanks for taking the time to express your thoughts. I know exactly
what you mean by '5 times harder and 10 times longer'. I think that's
why I am exploring alternatives first. Trade journals is a great
suggestion, I'll scout around.

Regards

Alon

 

[Tony Toews [MVP]]

Our company manufactures custom made shower doors.

There are some Access based MRP packages at the following page.

Microsoft Access Accounting Systems
http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsacct.htm

Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Please respond only in the newsgroups so that others can
read the entire thread of messages.
Microsoft Access Links, Hints, Tips & Accounting Systems at
http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm
Tony's Microsoft Access Blog - http://msmvps.com/blogs/access/

 

[Alon]

There are some Access based MRP packages at the following page.

Microsoft Access Accounting Systemshttp://www.granite.ab.ca/accsacct.htm

Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Please respond only in the newsgroups so that others can
read the entire thread of messages.
Microsoft Access Links, Hints, Tips & Accounting Systems athttp://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm
Tony's Microsoft Access Blog -http://msmvps.com/blogs/access/

Wow! I haven't downloaded any of the demos but this seems closer to
what I had in mind. Thanks Tony.

 

[Guest]

of money that it would require to acquire SAP or a similar product.

You can't avoid the analysis and design just by choosing a
high quality management information system anyway. You
would choose SAP because you wanted the SAP endpoint,
not because it would be less work

Nothing wrong with SAP, but the acquisition cost is the least of it.
The cost of SAP is the examination and modelling of your business.

Most (but not all) of the SAP installations I've seen haven't
understood this, and instead of starting with a 24 month
implementation program, they started with a 3 month implementation
program and 24 months of trying to make it work afterwards.

(david)