Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#301

Post by zubairq » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 1:39 PM UTC

alexis_fr wrote: post #111

thrower123 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as you bring HTML and JS in, projects choke and die. There is just too much goldbricking and fiddling and fussing and yak shaving around possible, and almost none of it is in service of actually making anything. The friction binds the gears up horrifically. Something like WinForms with SQLite that didn't use Entity Framework would be far better. But really all we want is to get back to VB6 on top of Access. M…

> As soon as you bring HTML and JS in, projects choke and die. True! I wonder whether making JS event handler in little textarea boxes would actually help. Select “Even handler for field ‘Name’ on ‘click’”, then program your event. Obviously the end result is a js file, but they user is guided...^W prevented from doing something else than modifying output before submission.

Yep, building something like this at github.com/Zubairq/pilot but it needs docker to run

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#302

Post by specialist » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 1:44 PM UTC

blihp wrote: post #225

specialist wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was never more productive than using Access. Once wrote a full budgeting, cost estimating tool. Supposedly impossible. (Access' VBA had an 'eval' function.) We lost something in the switch from "workgroup" (dBase thru Paradox) to client/server. Spoiler: ODBC broke the tight coupling of code and persistence. Spawning monstrous hacks like ORMs and ActiveRecord. What Ted Neward famously called The Vietnam of Computer…

The thing that was lost quite frankly was most of the value that desktop productivity software used to provide before Microsoft consumed the market with Windows. It's not that client/server couldn't provide the same (or even better) value, it's that the companies left standing (think Microsoft, Oracle, IBM etc.) had no interest in providing maximum value to customers. They wanted to extract maximum value from custome…

I don't have a thesis about the business (software publishing) aspects. Well, I do, but it's a tangent: Microsoft's failure to provide the much promised ramp from Access JET to SQL Server (which I also love) alienated me as a dev.

Here I'm only commenting on the impedance mismatch between code (biz logic) and persistence (eg RDBMS) introduced with ODBC. (Specifically, type information in the db schema is lost to the client code.)

Okay, writing this out now, Microsoft (and everyone else), probably didn't appreciate what was lost with ODBC, so didn't consider how to continue the Access style of CRUD to client/server. So we ended up with nonsense like LINQ.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#303

Post by phonon » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 1:46 PM UTC

motogpjimbo wrote: post #285

bob1029 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Being able to automate forms can absolutely revolutionize some businesses. Many business owners have no idea the extent to which automation is feasible here. I have seen fully manual paper process (printers/scanners/pen & ink/shredders/etc.) go into 100% digital realm and the impact it had on the business. It really is incredible the difference it makes. The most interesting factor was the fact that now that the inpu…

> Being able to automate forms can absolutely revolutionize some businesses I once worked for an insurance brokerage whose in-house CRM had started years before as an effort to automate paper-based forms. The company's business model was based on having their sales advisers fill out insurance policy application forms on their customers' behalf and originally this had been done using pen-and paper, which was obviously…

https://www.codeproject.com/Articles/466362/Blend-PDF-with-H...

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

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Post by zafiro17 » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 1:47 PM UTC

I'll put in a vote on behalf of access. I work in a consulting industry and as part of my work I have to track thousands of companies, individuals, tenders, and projects. It became obvious early on that a nice little DB would simplify the work. MS Access was there for me, already installed as part of the minimal software set they make available to us. Months later I offloaded the data to a Postgresql database (elephantsql.com) and continued using Access as a front end using the postgresql ODBC component. It's been perfect, and because all my data is offsite, it goes when I go. I have yet to find a better solution that Access as a front end to a postgresql database hosted elsewhere. To the person who suggested sqllite, I'd respond I'm reasonably technical but have no idea how to do that, so it's no solution to my problem. I used filemaker for a while on Apple. Linux has no GUI database front ends worth the while - Libreoffice Base is a weak substitute for Access. Kexi doesn't work as simply a front end. Excel isn't a database and we spend a lot of time laughing at people who use Excel when a DB is the proper tool. Any SAAS solution is out of the question; having a server dedicated to my/our use at work is out of the question. What's left is Access. Long may it live!

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#305

Post by mobjack » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 1:51 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #251

mobjack wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Access is highly underrated. I was able to build a CRUD app with 20 concurrent users in a month just using a shared directory to host the backend database. It would have taken a team of engineers 6 months to do the same properly developing a Java web app with Oracle database. Access does have such easy WYSIWYG reporting tools that I still miss.

You can do the same in Java. Netbeans with Swing UI designer and database bean components.

That would mean using a server for the database, which means lots of meetings getting buy in only for it to be prioritized to get done 9 months later.

You also have to deal with DBAs who like to say no and permissions every time you have to make a change.

Even if you broke down all the bureaucratic barriers, Access is still quicker to make a simple to make a simple CRUD UI than Java swing.

Sometimes worse is better.

Not saying I would use Access today but that is because I became a software engineer who has more authority to use the proper tools. When I started out as an data analyst, Access was the only thing available I had to get the job done and it did it well.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#306

Post by phonon » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:10 PM UTC

perl4ever wrote: post #175

mdorazio wrote: post #5

As the author points out, Access fills an interesting niche where Excel isn't quite enough, but a SQL database and all the stuff that goes along with it is way too much. On top of that, it's completely local so you don't have to pay for licenses or worry about data policies. That niche is big enough to sustain Access pretty much indefinitely. I think the lesson here is that business users more often than not want som…

I'm not clear on why you are referring to Access as an alternative to a "SQL based application". Access's SQL dialect is extremely annoying sometimes, but using SQL is a very significant (if not the most) reason for utilizing it rather than Excel. I went around and around trying to find a way to query Excel "tables" with SQL or something similar, but eventually gave up. There is something called DAX, but it seems dif…

https://sheetjs.com/sexql/index.html

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#307

Post by froindt » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:11 PM UTC

filmgirlcw wrote: post #156

When I was 14 or 15, my dad paid me to do work for him over the summer. He was in real estate and wanted to have a file/database entry for each of the floorplans and properties he was selling or building. Because I was so young, I used Access to create a CRUD app of sorts that kept details on all his projects. He used it for years. It’s embarrassing for me to admit how long it took me to make the connections between…

Young experiences are how you learn, and make a lasting impression! In high school I tinkered with computers a lot. I setup SMB shares, ftp servers, created basic websites, some basic query work. I developed a pretty solid mental model of how "computer systems" work and talk together.

Now that I'm in industry, I'm one of the people building these "shadow IT" solutions. I can clearly see how those late nights paid off.

I also act as a liason between the business and IT at times, and can help bridge the communication gaps.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#308

Post by gonzus » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:15 PM UTC

mamcx wrote: post #56

phs318u wrote: post #7

The reason that both Access and Excel use is so prevalent in corporate “shadow IT” land is because there are many parts of the business that have problems for which only a negative or marginal business-case can be made for IT to solve it (given the “get out of bed” costs of most IT departments). It’s a barrier-to-entry problem. Excel and Access are cheap enough and fly under the corporate IT radar (no involvement nee…

My dream is to build a modern take of the fox/dbase family. I starting with the inner language http://tablam.org Access, as concept, is great . Is exactly what many need. But it have a lot of small deficiencies that make it disliked by developers. I have used FoxPro, and it have almost all the right things instead (Fox is Access, but goooood!... except a bit less user friendly). I wish I could dedicate to build this.…

If you come from the dBase / Clipper experience, then Harbour could be considered a more modern version => https://github.com/harbour/core

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#309

Post by dr-detroit » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

mwexler wrote: post #13

Anyone want to suggest alternates? What's the "whip it up in a few hours" for "power users" today?

Don't run things on an unmanaged box on the floor in your office anymore. No more "My S.Q.L." no more flat file DBs saved in CIFS. If you have to ask these questions you're not the power user whipping up production code in a few hours with no framework or managed service you feel like you should still be.

Re: Microsoft Access: The Database Software That Won't Die

#310

Post by dr-detroit » Thu, Oct 31, 2019, 2:19 PM UTC

WorldMaker wrote: post #64

deckar01 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My organization recently adopted Office 365. One of the new apps was "PowerApps", a web-based GUI app builder. I popped open an example app inspected a button and, to my horror, I found the program logic was Excel syntax one-liners. When I checked the data binding for the app, it pointed to an XLSX spreadsheet on OneDrive. Time is a flat circle...

With 64-bit Excel capable of working with up to 4GB files, it sometimes feels like Excel itself ate/replaced Access for certain classes of business and shadow IT use.

Only 20 minutes to do a pivot table who needs practical skills when you have MS Office installed and the misplaced trust of your company?