Database recommendations

[bitdaf]

Hi all,

I need a little guidance and advice as to what type and how to as far as a database for our website.

http://www.ktbb.com/advertisers/

This is the index of the advertiser's listing on our site. As you can see they are just links to html pages that contain the data. The html pages are updated manually.

I would like to utilize a database system for this.

What would be the recommendations for this?

I'm leaning toward php and mysql since we have both with our web hosting package. But I have no idea how to implement it.
I would like a web based admin (backend) and the search results should look something like it does now - the links would key a search by category (plumbing, etc....)

So part 2 of my question would be if a recommendation could be made as to any software that would accomplish our goals. I took a look on hotscripts.com but since I have a weak understanding of the database terminology a lot of it went over my head.

It's been suggested that we (our company) should seek a professional service to create this database for us - that would be nice - but I can't help but think this is something that could be done in house.

Thanks!
Bitdaf

 

[mrdenny]

What you are looking to do is fairly standard. Most any database can handle it. Some that you can easly use are:

Microsoft Access
Microsoft SQL Server
MSDE (Microsoft SQL Server Desktop Edition)
Oracle
MySQL
Sybase
etc...

If your hosting company provides MySQL you should probably go with that.

MySQL does come with a web admin tool. You'll want to ask your web hosting company where there's is located. You can easily create a web tool to keep the data up to date.

With reguard to how the data is displayed on the site, that all depends on how to tell the php or asp or jsp pages to show up.

Doing something like this will require a good understanding of how databases work, the programming language of the database and the programming language of the web scripts (you said PHP above).

If you aren't in any sort of rush you can learn this yourself and do the entire thing on your own. However if you want it done quickly (or you just don't want to learn all this stuff) a consultant will be the way to go. A consultant can probably get all this done within a couple of weeks.

Denny
MCSA (2003) / MCDBA (SQL 2000)

--Anything is possible. All it takes is a little research. (Me)

http://www.mrdenny.com

(Not quite so old any more.)

 

[bitdaf]

Thank you for your reply, Denny. I really appreciate it!

Bitdaf

 

[mrdenny]

no problem.

Denny
MCSA (2003) / MCDBA (SQL 2000)

--Anything is possible. All it takes is a little research. (Me)

http://www.mrdenny.com

(Not quite so old any more.)