Breaking up with Access

[LARiot]

So I've had this relationship with MS-Access for over a decade. It was causal at first, I'd see her a few days here and there on certain projects. Later on it became more serious as I stopped seeing other platforms and developed in Access exclusively... However the relationship has lost it's thrill and it's time to move on.

What I'm asking you, my dear reader, is what you would recommend? What are the hottest development tools on the market. I looked into Ruby and Ruby on Rails and though it was very attractive it didn't seem to have much substance. Right now I'm eyeing PHP as a small client wants something done on the web in PHP and MySQL. Before I dive in to a commitment I want to know your opinion. It seems like it's been around for a while and will even longer. One of the recruiters told me that I should look into SSRS (SQL Server Reporting Services) with my background. Should I court PHP? Should I look back into Ruby? Should I go with what I know with SSRS and SQL Server? Keeping in mind, of course, market demand and it's future.

Any input is appreciated.

-Nima
"Pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitate", i.e., "Plurality is not to be posited without necessity" aka K.I.S.S. (Keep It Short and Simple) -- Ockham's Razor

 

[Noway2]

There is no one right or wrong answer to your question and the ultimate answer will depend on both what you want to do, your background, and your comfort level with learning new things. When you say that you had a relationship with MS-Access, I assume you mean that you are a database person and have developed applications around this particular flavor of database. In your post you mention both a couple of programming languages, PHP and Ruby, a programming framework (Ruby on Rails, aka Rails), a database MySQL, and the SQL Reporting Services. What is your comfort level with programming? If you are comfortable with it, PHP is very much like C (I think P with some PERL built). If you are somewhat uncomfortable with the low level programming, but still want the flexibility of database backed web design, I would take a close look at Rails which also seems to be getting quite popular these days. If you wish to stay at the application level, or with M$ platforms, then steer towards the Reporting Services. If you do decide to go with a programming approach, be sure that you spend time learning what you are doing, especially with regards to programming securely as many a web sites have been exploited by custom code.

I would also say that, if you haven't already, that solidly learning the fundamentals of SQL will help you in any of these endeavors and allow you to work with just about any database platform (SQL-Server, Oracle, MySQL, etc). While each of these will have their own variations of syntax and expand upon the Standard SQL language, if you focus on learning how to perform and understand queries, joins, and inserts you will be able to work with any of them given a little while to learn the specific nuances.

 

[flapeyre]

I have found that more organizations are looking to move to SQL Server and SSRS from Access. For example, the place where I'm contracting to now. Microsoft has migration wizards for that.

For ad-hoc stuff, the power users can always use Report Builder if they so desire. The more complex stuff requires SSRS reports.

I have no experience with MySQL, or Ruby, so I can't comment on those. However, for SSRS reports - if at all possible, use stored procedures on the backend of the reports (rather than putting the SQL SELECTs in the report itself). This simplifies maintenance and generally makes things run more efficiently.

-- Francis
There are laws to protect the freedom of the press's speech, but none that are worth anything to protect the people from the press.
--Mark Twain

 

[philhege]

Be careful with SSRS. It's meant to be a reporting output tool, and won't duplicate any of your deeper Access data manipulation functionality.

Look into the Web programming languages to port any of your Access application functions. SSRS is great for the reporting pieces if you're SQL-centric. It can support many different data sources as shown here.

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With business clients like mine, you'd be better off herding cats.

 

[LARiot]

So how do I learn SSRS?

-Nima
"Pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitate", i.e., "Plurality is not to be posited without necessity" aka K.I.S.S. (Keep It Short and Simple) -- Ockham's Razor

 

[philhege]

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb522859.aspx

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With business clients like mine, you'd be better off herding cats.