Information Store

Hi,

I'm hoping someone can give me a steer on what a "professional"
application developer might do in this situation. I just want a shove
toward the best practice so I don't get ripped up later!

I'm going to put together a large script that will act as an fancy
interface to a lot of management information about many IP enabled
devices in a logical management domain. Today there are around 200
devices but next year there may be a thousand and my application has
to be able to scale the information store that I choose to
incorporate. Many clients may use this application but the data source
will be kept centrally on a network drive.

My mock up is using a .mdb and that makes it a breeze to update,
modify and delete records, but I can't help but wonder about XML and
whether something could be done with it here as there is a possibility
that future 3rd parties may wish to tap into the data too.

Any advice appreciated (as always),

Stuart

In the absence of more information I would tend to stick with an .mdb. Will
XML scale easily to the number of devices you are talking about.
--
Richard Siddaway
All scripts are supplied "as is" and with no warranty
PowerShell MVP
Blog: http://richardsiddaway.spaces.live.com/
PowerShell User Group: http://www.get-psuguk.org.uk


"Kryten" wrote:

I agree with Rich, XML is great for sharing information amongst groups of
people or applications; this is not listed as one of your prerequisite. If
you are going to be needing information for many IP devices in random order
XML would be slow.

Given you've also mentioned that many people would be using this (I'm
assuming simultaneous) I would choice a database carefully Access I'm nearly
certain won't fill this requirement . Micorosoft does have a database that
comes with VS which I thought would handle 10s to 100 or more queries at the
same time. But I don't know what its called nor have I ever used it. I'm
going purely from 2nd hand info.


"Kryten" wrote:

Hi,

I tried a mock-up with an XML containing the data for just the first
50 of the IP devices.
Thats enough to convince me that a .mdb is better for this.

I'll take onboard your comments about using Access though. I guess SQL
is the
way to go?

Thanks,
Stuart

Id say SQL Server is probably your best best if you are looking for
scalability. Just make sure if you are using it for commercial
production you get your company to purchase the full version. The EULA
for the express versions specifically states - You MAY NOT use the
software for commercial software hosting services.

Thanks Marco - thats very useful information indeed.

I was beginning to wonder how to go about creating and potentially
redistributing a sql database. The link you gave offers a lot of good
information
and downloads.

Looks like SQL Server 2005 Express is a good choice. One question
though;
(to save me downloading and installing into a VM just to try it!) does
the
SQL Server Express Management Studio make it possible to view and work
with tables in an Access'ish kind of way?

I like being able to view the data in the tables in a GUI while
developing the
Posh application alongside.

Thanks for all the help,

Stuart

http://images.google.com/images?hl=e...h+Images&gbv=2

This will show lots of screenshots of the SQL Server Express
Management Studio. I have used it quite a bit and think it's a nice
tool.

Thanks Kuma - it looks like exactly what I need.
I'll definitely be trying this out.

Thanks again,
Stuart