Advice Needed

[Totes]

Hello Everyone,

I have a question and I'm not sure where to post it so Ill try here as I may need a remote server to pull this off.

As those of you that have helped me in the past know, I am in law enforcement and this question relates to my work.

I have a database I built that collects data about crimes in our county ( I wont go into long boring detail about all the fields etc.).

The problem is that in my line of work the person doing the crime may not be from our county, in a majority of cases the person is just a county over.

So, what I would like to do is place the db we use at my department in an adjacent county PD and then merge the data from the two db’s every so often (so we have their data and they have ours).

My question is this:

If I did it the way I have it laid out in my head…I get the db from my department and then get the db form the other department and try to put their data with ours and ours with theirs…how will I not cause a problem with PK’s etc.

I'm sure there is a much better way and that is question 2.

Is there is much better way to do what I want so everyone can share data? Do I need a remote server?

I don’t think IWP will work for what we need.

So can someone tell me if my idea is a dead frog and if there is a better way to share data between two agencies a county apart.

Thanks,

James

Edited February 14, 2008 by Guest

[Fenton]

If you are satisfied with the speed of a WAN connection, then that is likely the way to go. One database, everyone can see it from wherever. No synchronization problems, which are difficult to solve correctly, even for experienced developers.

If you use a FileMaker hosting company to serve the file, for a small monthly fee, then it will be available 24/7. You would not have to buy FileMaker Server software, nor deal with the hardware.

You would want to get the major development done beforehand however, as it's a little more trouble to develop in that environment. Alternatively you could investigate the "separation of data method," which is ideally suited to this kind of situation. It it really not that difficult.

What kind of numbers are we talking here, as far as data goes? Thousands of records? Hundreds of thousands? Millions? If millions, then you'd need to take special steps to keep the speed acceptable (archive old data, etc.), hundreds of thousands can be made to work OK, with some effort (good relational work to limit found sets). Thousands is no problem, if you design it well.

When you have remote users, there is always issues with speed/money/synchronization. If you have need the fastest speed possible, and have a fair amount of money (not really that much, considering what it does), then there is software, SyncDek, which solves FileMaker synch problems. If you need lots of speed, don't have much money, but are a red-hot FileMaker developer, then you could build a massive synchronization routine (but if you're smart you'd just buy SynchDek :-). If you don't need the fastest possible speed, don't have a lot of money, nor are a red-hot developer with lots of time on your hands, then a hosted file with WAN access is a good solution.

[Totes]

Thanks for the info, I think I can now move in the right direction.

James