Is Access a viable DB for a start up website vs. SQL?

[shellyanne]

We are currently planning to develop a website that will need to be driven by a database (majority of site is searching records, and adding records). We are looking at developing the database within ACCESS and when traffic warrants migrating that to SQL or something else more robust. I would be interested in any feedback as to the pros/cons of using either of these DB programs, as well as any major issues that might affect code when migrating to SQL in the future. Does anyone also have experience or knowlege with respect to how many concurrent users Access can handle before performance drops are noticed? I thank each and every one of your for your feedback in advance!

 

[r937]

word on the street is that access will handle up to six or ten concurrent users

i would like to stress that concurrent means at the same time and that this is in effect only while their queries are actually being processed

look at it this way -- if you got 10,000 hits per day (and i should only wish my site were that popular), this means approx 400 per hour or 7 per minute or one hit every 8 seconds

if each query executes in 2 seconds, then each user will be in and out before the next one comes along

of course, hits are not spread out uniformly, they occur in peaks, so at peak times, you may actually have one or two users queued up waiting for the ones in front of them to finish! when the queue gets longer than about six or ten, access sometimes -- not always, just sometimes -- crashes

that's because access single-threads users, whereas sql/server can multi-thread them

so to answer your question, yes, access is a perfectly viable solution for a startup database-enabled web site

there are differences between access sql and sql/server sql, but they are relatively minor

rudy

http://rudy.ca/

 

[shellyanne]

Thank you for your comments Rudy. Considering that I know the site will undergo additions and have minor changes, I figured it would be safer to speed development and conserve on financial resources to basically build a "beta" version of the site. Once we know we have it all, then use the upsizing wizard in Access to switch over to SQL. Then we will have been live for a few months, and have confirmed the working components of our site are as we need them. What do you think of this methodology? Have you ever had to convert an Access database with the MSDE engine to SQL in a similar fashion? The stuff I found online yesterday indicated that 35 concurrent users could be handled by Access, and considering the powerful hardware available today we figured it would be a good "start" or "test" for the site. However I dont want to have to "recreate" all of the code etc... in making the switch. Any suggestions or feedback to ensure if and when we go through that process that we dont have to start over? Thanks again for your insight. It is much appreciated.

 

[r937]

hmm, i replied again, but it got lost

i wish i could remember all the clever things i said

basically, it was: go for it

i have not done the upsizing myself but there will be very little difference in the sql between msde engine and sql/server (jet engine was more different)

besides, you have the full support of microsoft behind you, so how much trouble could you possible have?

rudy