Comment Re:Enabling the ignorant (Score 1) 195
I agree that the Access/Excel applications that I have seen have not been normalized and at times have produced wrong data due to the operator not knowing database design, but if you think of the vast numbers of access databases out there, you have to ask the question: Would we be better off with them or without them?
On the whole, I come down on the side that Access has been a net gain. Most of the smart businesses I have interacted with new when they had outgrown it.
What are the alternatives other than not having such a tool (this is not a rhetorical question)? Training perhaps? All the alternatives that surfaced during my tenure in IT could not be implemented by the user. If you are going to take away something, you have to have something to hand them in its place.
On the whole, I come down on the side that Access has been a net gain. Most of the smart businesses I have interacted with new when they had outgrown it.
What are the alternatives other than not having such a tool (this is not a rhetorical question)? Training perhaps? All the alternatives that surfaced during my tenure in IT could not be implemented by the user. If you are going to take away something, you have to have something to hand them in its place.
