From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: from lists.gentoo.org (pigeon.gentoo.org [208.92.234.80]) by finch.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A72D21381F3 for ; Wed, 31 Jul 2013 17:39:39 +0000 (UTC) Received: from pigeon.gentoo.org (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with SMTP id 401DCE09A2; Wed, 31 Jul 2013 17:39:31 +0000 (UTC) Received: from mail16.tpgi.com.au (mail16.tpgi.com.au [203.12.160.231]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by pigeon.gentoo.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id BEA31E0956 for ; Wed, 31 Jul 2013 17:39:29 +0000 (UTC) X-TPG-Junk-Status: Message not scanned X-TPG-Antivirus: Passed X-TPG-Abuse: host=27-33-235-192.static.tpgi.com.au; ip=27.33.235.192; date=Thu, 1 Aug 2013 03:39:25 +1000 Received: from [192.168.14.4] (27-33-235-192.static.tpgi.com.au [27.33.235.192]) by mail16.tpgi.com.au (envelope-from agl@wht.com.au) (8.14.3/8.14.3) with ESMTP id r6VHdNZt023885 for ; Thu, 1 Aug 2013 03:39:25 +1000 Message-ID: <51F94BCA.1090500@wht.com.au> Date: Thu, 01 Aug 2013 01:39:22 +0800 From: Andrew Lowe Organization: Wombat High Tech User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; rv:17.0) Gecko/20130620 Thunderbird/17.0.7 Precedence: bulk List-Post: List-Help: List-Unsubscribe: List-Subscribe: List-Id: Gentoo Linux mail X-BeenThere: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Reply-to: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org MIME-Version: 1.0 To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] SQL Server Advice for Small Business References: <20130729202238.GA23113@artifex> In-Reply-To: Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit X-Archives-Salt: b53afd4c-cece-4616-91c5-ace1814d95ad X-Archives-Hash: 35872779240d93fcfe96861e16879c06 > On Mon, July 29, 2013 22:22, Randy Westlund wrote: > Hey guys, > > I'm planning to set up an SQL server for my dad's small canvas awning > business, and I've never done this before. Most of my sysadmin-type > skills are self-taught. I could use some advice. [snip] Randy, I've read your original post and subsequently the answers. One question that nobody raised about your original post was why are you writing something for your fathers company in the first place? Why aren't you looking at ERP packages such as Compiere, Adempiere, Tryton, OpenERP etc etc? In other words, why are you reinventing the wheel? With these systems, you will get all of the data entry stuff already set up and you can then do your data analysis stuff, although these systems also do heaps of this stuff already. You don't mention what you do for a crust, but if you do a good implementation of one at your Dad's place, you could sell your services to other companies. Someone mentioned PostGIS - forget it. You want to generate heat maps based upon where business is going. This does not need a GIS. If you are generating "real", accurate maps, then a GIS would be what you want, but in this case, you just need a rough "mudmap" of the areas in question. This would just show that City A is north west, ie the top left side of the page, from you, which is in the centre, company B is east, the right hand side of the page etc and based upon this, generate your heat map. Scale, true orientation and position are not important. Even just grab a Google Earth screen grab of your area and then write something what will add heat, colours, to it in the appropriate places. You mentioned a "small database". Don't underestimate how big things can get quickly. If, at the moment when someone is spec'ing a job, and they take photo's, but subsequently those photo's are hard to access, they won't take the photo's in the first place. If you set up an easy to access repository for the photo's, people will start taking more photo's. If there are CAD drawings, what are they? 2D/3D, AutoCAD/MicroStation or full on Solidworks solid models? These get big very quickly. Scanned notes etc just add more and more. I have a feeling that your small db could get big quickly. Just plan for that. In closing, these are just my five cents worth, we no longer have two cent pieces in Australia, regarding the software. I have no idea on the hardware except as someone mentioned back up, back up and back up. Oh, also, the more RAM the merrier. Good luck, Andrew