Office XP vs Access 2002 workflow

[marc1tim]

Hello,

We have a medium workflow project that could be done in Office XP or Access. Current each document is emailed arround with everyone entering (unformatted) notes in a word document. This is creating nightmare at the end of the process to tabulate and summarize the commants.

My Question:

How easy is it to create a smooth and idiot proof interface in Office 2000 or XP?

I've done several Access applications. I have a stakeholder that believes Office is the answer but I'm not convinced yet. Thinking that the whole things screeming to be online. Any advice, opinions or experience will be appreciated.

Tim

 

[rdodge]

Well to answer that question, need to ask yourself [and others], "What are the needs of the program?" Once you have that question answered, you then compare that to what you can do with Office 2k/XP to Access. Keep in mind of what you can do versus can't do with each of the application programs, like in Word and Excel, you can setup templates, could even setup something like a mail merge type deal in Word while using worksheets to setup table like with Excel, but also keep in mind of the various limitations. In Word, data is not the easiest thing to work with. In Excel, data is relatively easy to work with, but very limited in other ways like can't exceed 160MB OF RAM usage, external formula links gets to be a no way can do once so much data is accumulated, only have limited number of records (66536 max) within a single worksheet in a single set of columns, manage of data is very clumsy as sorting could accidentally cause a column to be left out (even though there is a warning message that comes up to confirm first), data security is very flimsy (practically none as all of the passwords within the file can be broken via third party programs, and some by code too). Excel does have Userforms, but there are also some differences between a userform in Excel as compared to a Form in Access, including some technicality differences in the controls between the 2.

I look at it this way, Excel is good for short-term and/or small projects and also for proto-typing, but then Access is good for larger long-term type projects as long as it doesn't get to be too big for it to handle.

Ronald R. Dodge, Jr.
Production Statistician
Master MOUS 2000
When the going gets tough, the tough gets going.

 

[marc1tim]

That's exactly my take on it too, But I'm note sure if that correct. I can't find any real guidence/direction from Microsoft.

 

[rdodge]

I'm actually speaking from experience of doing a lot of different things within Excel including VBA coding and I'm also currently in the process of setting up a manufacturing type DB program in Access given the various issues that I have ran into with Excel. On the other hand, setting up Access can take a lot longer time period, so that's why you need to consider the various things and decide which way to go. Of course, I realize I'm not like most people programming in VBA cause I tend to be very critical as I have high requirements on both, theintegrety of the data and user friendliness, but then what also needs to be taken into account is how much time and cost it will take.

Ronald R. Dodge, Jr.
Production Statistician
Master MOUS 2000
When the going gets tough, the tough gets going.