I am hoping for some advice on how to begin creating an online database. I have some electronic publishing experience, but from the literature I have read, I have no real understanding of how to create a functional database. This project is for work. I am looking to create a database to which data from Access can be imported. The end result would be a searchable obituary index where users can search by name and find the date and page for obituaries printed in the local newspaper. Ideally, the search page would allow the user to search by last name (possibly first name, though when the access database was created in the mid-1990s, the entire name was entered in the same cell.), as well as date. Any advice would be helpful, including if there are any recommendations regarding software programs that would achieve the desired result. In addition to how to get started, I was wondering about a few other things. Should this be hosted on our in-house server or hosted remotely online? (Our website is hosted remotely) How would I make this database secure? What other issues may I run into? Thanks, Tek
Yeah, you can export the data from msaccess database to your hosting database server and can create a scripting page that searches the database and displays the matching results. You can host it on your remote hosting as your other websites. Data in the databases is normally secure from the hosting point. You just have to make sure that your code is fool proof so that users cannot tweak around to see what they are not supposed to. And if you thing you want the data to be still very secure, you can encrypt the data in the database so that even if someone has access to the database the data in it will not make any sense to them. I don't forsee any issues except that your accesss database is almost a decade older, not sure if it opens fine with the current versions of the msaccess for us to import the data.
Thank you for this information. So how would you recommend I get started? What program might I use to write the code in? I am certainly a novice in this area and any advice you can offer will be greatly appreciated.
What languages does the hosting at your current remotely hosted web site supports? I assume that you will be hosting this site as well with the same hosts, so depending on what they support, you can either use PHP or ASP.NET and database could be either MYSQL or SQL Server.
