[AccessD] Is it over for desktop apps?

[James Button]

Answering 2 first -
My clients use laptops to run the apps I created and support.
Those work on secure systems  in sub-basements, and out in the countryside -
wilds of Scotland, Wales, north and southwest of England where the internet
connections are, to put it politely not a viable option for cloud accessed data
manipulation.
When they get to locations where there is a secure web access, then they can
access their corporate server facility, with its security facilities.
 
For web connection, browser and emails etc.  there are their iphones.

Yes, there is the new "Office Script", providing their systems have the
appropriate licences, 
and they can get someone else to create the apps, and then modify them as needed
 - ms changes, client requirements and changing corporate reporting processes.

They will, I presume also have to - individually - deal with the changes MS
apply to the apps and working environment.
That, or go to fully managed systems - maybe 32GB RAM I7 level cloud  based
virtual systems running Win-Pro
Is that about £60 a month?, plus needing a fast device and a full time 10GB
connection to  use that cloun OS.

Oh!,
And I too am supposedly retired, the apps I support having been created when I
was employed, and I now provide support as my employers ceased trading, leaving
the clients looking at a few 100K for a rewrite, and then paying for the rights
to the created apps, and paying a software house for maintenance, or persuading
me to provide support as needed.

So, Question 1 
No - not developing new apps, as that would mean resuming activities as a fully
trained coder in web based software - and charging enough to cover the continual
re-training, and development environment.

And 3 - 
What would you use to do what VBA seems to be (mostly) good, and at what cost -
cash, and stress.
And what will be the minimum cost  just to setup to do that.

As far as using a cloud 'service' to store your data, rather than an in-house
system ..
Consider -  
The data will only be accessible through a www level? comms service provider.
 The hardware containing the data will probably be owned by a different
organisation
And the storage used for your data will probably be leased (rented) by the
organisation selling you the storage access service.
Then - consider a liquidator's primary task -
Make as much for the creditors as possible.
You have no contract with the liquidator.
So your privacy agreements are void.
And what sells for more -
A working system, or a collection of wiped drives  - remembering that wiping
drives is an additional cost to the creditors!

So - should any sensible business rely on data and systems being held on a cloud
server  storage cluster - in what continent ? and only accessible via the linked
service providers, or
 - on your own servers, in your corporate storage area, with your own access
control, and whatever comms providers you want to trust to provide the
connections for your encrypted connections ?

Or  is that far too much for corporate consideration, - same as backups that are
crypto-malware, and earthquake/flood safe?

JimB
  

-----Original Message-----
From: AccessD
<accessd-bounces+jamesbutton=blueyonder.co.uk at databaseadvisors.com> On Behalf Of
Arthur Fuller
Sent: Sunday, September 11, 2022 5:17 PM
To: Access Developers discussion and problem solving
<accessd at databaseadvisors.com>
Subject: [AccessD] Is it over for desktop apps?

Recently I came across (on Quora) the following remark regarding fully
fledged desktop applications. "Personally I think those days are nearly
over and it would be best to move to the cloud straight away."

Although technically I am retired and have been so for a number of years, I
spent a good number of years developing desktop apps, primarily in Access
but also in a couple of other languages.

The term "desktop apps" includes both strictly desktop (both FE and BE on
the same machine) and apps that live on a small network, with the BE living
on a server. I have never written an app that lives in the cloud, even
though I have a license to MS 365. Mostly my experience with the cloud is
off-site backup. I tend to develop locally, so to speak, and then copy to
OneDrive frequently.

I'm curious as to your experience.

1. Do you develop apps for use on the cloud? If so, approximately what
percentage of your apps live there?
2. Assuming that the client of interest has an internet connection, is
there any reason to develop your apps *not *for the cloud?
3. Are there shortcomings (specifically with Office in mind) to
cloud-based-apps that desktops apps do not suffer? I mention Office because
many if not most of the apps I've written in the past couple of decades
have consisted of pieces written in Access, Word and Excel; a few of these
are quite elaborate, involving exports to Excel first, then creating tables
within Word documents, formatted according to standards mandated by various
provincial governments, and in Canada that may also involve translation
from English to French.

Let's stick to Access, for the moment. I have only a little experience
deploying apps to hundreds or thousands of users. Mainly I've worked with
smallish corporations or government branches with, give or take, a hundred
users in a few cities, all connected to a Windows Terminal Server. My
thoughts back then were that the FE should reside locally, on each box; and
I took the time to create a self-extracting EXE which would deposit the
latest install or update locally, with its connection to the server baked
in.

Bear in mind that in a couple of months I'll be 75yo, and so have probably
--nay, certainly -- fallen far behind current thinking and technologies. So
I'm asking for you to help me patch and paddle this leaking canoe.

Should I be thinking exclusively in terms of the cloud? Is it essentially
over for local servers (one per office, approximately)? If so, does that
mean that the market for local servers is over? What advantage is to be
gained, if any, by having a local server, as opposed to running it all on
the cloud?

And now we return to the classic question, albeit with a cloudy twist.
Should the FE reside in the cloud, as well as the BE?

And finally, can I copyright the name McCloud? Of course, I dropped the "e"
and I know it! I am also confused by the spellings of "McX" and "MacX",
wherein "X" stands for anything from "Donald" to "Hoolihan" to "Robertson"
and any other letters I've left out -- oops, cannot omit Mathew Matthew
McConnaughey. There are names of towns in Wales easier to spell than
Matthew's surname. It's only fair: you can't be that handsome and have a
name like "Bill Smith" or even worse, "Arthur Fuller.
*Back to the Cloud*, the original subject of this admittedly incherent
message. As so accused, I plead Guilty to the charge of Incoherence. In the
past month, I have suffered two strokes, and while still able to speak and
type, walking has become an issue. As William Burroughs said, "If I'd known
I were going to live this long, I should have taken better care of myself."
(Being a fussbudget, I corrected his spelling.)
New idea for the next Olympics: Aquatic Spelling Bees. The contestants wear
waterproof earphones and listen to the words to spell, and then enunciate
them underwater -- something similar to two divers trying to communicate
distress while two hundred feet beneath the water's surface. That could be
serious fun!


-- 
Arthur
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