[AccessD] From a reader

Drew Wutka DWUTKA at Marlow.com
Tue Feb 8 18:21:06 CST 2011


Hmmmm, actually, I'd be leery of a 'commercial site' using strictly
notepad.  What about data?  Now if you gave them a blank .mdb, or access
to a blank SQL Database, and they created the entire data structure
using T-SQL, ok, I'd be impressed! LOL 

What is the most striking issue, in my book, is just understanding the
concepts of what your 'tools' are really doing in the back ground.
ASP.Net is pretty slick, but boy, if you don't really understand what it
is doing in the background, you are going to create one heck of a mess
if you aren't careful.

I just went through the wringer with a side project.  It's a rebuild of
a web form I built about 6 or 7 years ago.  The original form was built
using classic ASP, and VB 6 (for .dll's that did the business logic with
the database).  Way back then, I wasn't very good with javascript, so I
was kind of limited on what I was doing from the client scripting side.
They wanted several changes to that form, so we rebuilt it in .Net.
There's a very long story as to what put me through the most hell, but
one of the things that just boggled my mind was a 'custom' application
they used on their end.  They called it Passport.  Basically, it was a
custom 'user login' platform.  In an NT environment, with multiple
forests/domains, an 'intranet' in such an environment can't truly
utilize Active Directory accounts.  Not without some serious
workarounds.  So they built a 'system' to allow users to 'log in' to
their Intranet, that controlled what applications various users could
use.

Now, technically, all my system needed to know was the username of the
person currently 'logged in'.  That allowed me to filter certain
information for just that user.  That's it.  The rest of my application
was strictly its own system, with its own database, etc.  I had my
project setup so that there were only 3 places where I needed to
'inject' this custom systems 'logged in user', which I was using a
querystring value for development/placeholder purposes.  Instead of just
saying, ok, use this 'code', what I ended up having to do, is setup a
complete server (virtual) with SQL Server, and VS 2010, so they could
'install' their system, because they wanted me to send them a 'complete'
project.  The reality was, I had to take my project, and make it a 'sub'
project to theirs.  What a pain.  And what OVERKILL when it comes to
that system.  Lord have mercy, the complexity they threw into this
thing......  it was the equivalent of using Airforce 1 as a golf
cart.....

Drew

-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Jim Lawrence
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 2:45 PM
To: 'Access Developers discussion and problem solving'
Subject: Re: [AccessD] From a reader

No one should be able to build a web site with any tool until they can
prove
they can build a commercial site with note-pad. ;-)

Jim



-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Drew Wutka
Sent: Tuesday, February 08, 2011 11:30 AM
To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
Subject: Re: [AccessD] From a reader

The funny thing is, the reason Access gets such a bad name is that it
can be used by amateurs, and when that happens, you get clunky.

A professional Access developer understands what an .mdb is.  They
understand the inner-workings enough to optimize performance. 

This is the same reason so many 'clunky' web applications have been
made.

How many Access pro's could tell you EXACTLY what Jet is doing when you
are running 'SELECT * FROM tblSomething WHERE ID=1' against a table in a
backend .mdb?  Probably very few.  How many could give you a conceptual
statement as to what is happening, like 'Jet is reading the index values
from the b/e .mdb, and then using that information to determine where to
start reading the table data'?  Probably most.  Yet how many 'amateurs'
have even a conceptual understanding?  They don't need to, Access just
does things for them.

Same problem with the web.  There are a WIDE variety of tools available,
that let someone with little to no understanding of a
website/webserver/browser system throw a 'fully functioning' (<--- term
used very loosely) 'website' (<---also used very loosely) up into
production.  It has been this way for a while.  

Drew

-----Original Message-----
From: accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com
[mailto:accessd-bounces at databaseadvisors.com] On Behalf Of Mark Simms
Sent: Thursday, February 03, 2011 8:30 PM
To: 'Access Developers discussion and problem solving'
Subject: Re: [AccessD] From a reader

I just LOVE that word "Clunky" to describe a web app !!

When everyone says how great the web is, I just point out all of the
"clunky" webapps I have to tolerate....from my bank, to my insurance
company, and on and on it goes. Then I get to a client site and have to
tolerate all of THEIR clunky webapps. They are slow, they don't respond,
they forget to validate, etc, etc., they don't integrate with windows,
they
don't cut-and-paste properly, and the list just goes on forever.

I'm going for a long, long winternight's sleep. Someone wake me up when
all
clunky web apps have been upgraded to Web 2.0 standards.


> make it 'look' like an access combobox, and act like it, but what's
> happening in the background is clunky.  First, .Net is creating
> javascript on the client side that is reacting to the 'OnClick' of the
> combobox (or index changed event), then it's sending all the current


-- 
AccessD mailing list
AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd
Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com
The information contained in this transmission is intended only for the
person or entity 
to which it is addressed and may contain II-VI Proprietary and/or II-VI
Business 
Sensitive material. If you are not the intended recipient, please
contact
the sender 
immediately and destroy the material in its entirety, whether electronic
or
hard copy. 
You are notified that any review, retransmission, copying, disclosure,
dissemination, 
or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon this
information
by persons 
or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited.


-- 
AccessD mailing list
AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd
Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com

-- 
AccessD mailing list
AccessD at databaseadvisors.com
http://databaseadvisors.com/mailman/listinfo/accessd
Website: http://www.databaseadvisors.com
The information contained in this transmission is intended only for the person or entity 
to which it is addressed and may contain II-VI Proprietary and/or II-VI Business 
Sensitive material. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender 
immediately and destroy the material in its entirety, whether electronic or hard copy. 
You are notified that any review, retransmission, copying, disclosure, dissemination, 
or other use of, or taking of any action in reliance upon this information by persons 
or entities other than the intended recipient is prohibited.





More information about the AccessD mailing list