CIS 205 Database Paper

CIS 205 Database Paper

Database systems play a major role in the everyday operations and functions of almost all businesses today. Because the success of a business can rely so heavily on how well these systems handle data, database systems may be the most important system to invest in.   The choice of which system should be implemented to handle the business critical data should be very thoroughly planned out. This paper will look at a business that has two systems with different storage solutions and how they differ.
Both of the systems run on a Windows XP platform, but use separate software for the collection of and the storage of data.
The fist system has a pretty robust data management system that utilizes several different database applications. The main storage point of daily sales, inventory, and any other data relative to daily operations, is MS SQL Server 2005. There are several advantages to using this particular DB application verses others in this instance. Firstly, since the POS system is built on the .NET framework, interfacing with another Microsoft technology like SQL Server is made easier than perhaps MySQL. Also the size of the business and its data storage needs are well suited to SQL Server. A smaller business like this one does not need the enterprise sized solutions and extra costs of maybe an Oracle based system. On the other end of application size, MS Access would not be sufficient enough to handle the size of the data or some of the daily automated task that SQL Server can.
In addition to using SQL Server for most of the storage, the system has options for exporting the same data into multiple formats, xml and csv, for alternative data storage. This feature can allow the business to have a redundant data backup system in place to recover from any catastrophic system failure. Also having access to the data in these portable formats can allow for development of new applications for consuming the data in ways that may not be available through the current...