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Evaluating Situational Applications
Builders
Mark GREGORY
Department of Finance and Operations, ESC Rennes School of Business
35065 Rennes Cedex, France
Tel: +33 2 99 33 48 55 Fax: +33 2 99 33 08 24
and
Dr. Mario NORBIS
Department of Management, Quinnipiac University
Hamden, Connecticut 06518, USA
Tel: +1 413 335 2837
Abstract This paper introduces a number of applications builders which can be used by non-technical users to
build and deploy business information systems. The emphasis is on different ways to build applications
which are deployable on the Web. The applications so created are frequently said to be hosted “in the
cloud”, that is, on Web servers which may not be under the direct control or ownership of the
organisation which owns the information.
IBM has suggested a new name for this category of simple applications builders: "situational
applications builders": see for example Cherbakov, L. & A. Bravery & B. D. Goodman & A. Pandya &
J. Baggett (2007).
This paper reviews certain applications builders and puts forward methods to evaluate them.
Keywords: Situational applications, Web application builders, PaaS – Platform as a Service, SaaS – Software as a Service
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1. Why end-users need to build and deploy
small-scale business information systems The ways in which a company can procure the business applications necessary for its operations include
combinations of three basic approaches which are already widely accepted, and a fourth:
1. Bespoke (custom) development; this requires technical skills
2. Purchase and use of packaged applications
3. Systems integration – composing applications from different components found on
the web; this requires technical skills
4. So-called “end user programming”, which can be done by business professionals.
There are many Information Systems requirements which are on a relatively small scale, and where
reasonably-courageous individuals, sometimes referred to as “power users”, set out to build their own
small-scale Information Systems. They do this, rather than wait for a large-scale, no doubt better-
engineered but much later solution produced by Information Systems professionals. Elizabeth Regan
has written extensively on this phenomenon, sometimes known as "end-user programming"; see for
example Regan, E.A., O'Connor, B.N. (2002).
1.1. Recap: Storing small amounts of structured data
The context of this research is end-users within medium and large enterprises. Its findings may
also be applicable in small and very small enterprises.
We normally store data on computers:
Either when we have many occurrences of a specific kind of record each with a well-defined structure, and we want to process specific records, or complete sets of records. This is sometimes referred to as structured data and it is on this that we concentrate in this paper.
Or where we have complex, semi-structured information requirements at the personal or small-group level. This situation is addressed in a separate paper, Gregory M.R. & Norbis M. (2009).
A widely accepted way of storing data, indeed, we may even refer to it as the “natural” way to
store such data, is by means of two-dimensional tables.
Many widely used office productivity programs or suites provide good facilities for storing
two-dimensional tables. For example, when using Microsoft Office
http://office.microsoft.com/, the most widely-used such suite, each program has specific
strengths and weaknesses when it stores data in this way. Figure 1 summarises the approaches,
and their comparative strengths and weaknesses.
Method Advantages Disadvantages
Word Simple, well understood by people
with weak computing skills
No formulae (or only very
rudimentary ones)
Excellent formatting options
Excel Some degree of structure – rows and
columns
Persistent data is not safe
Very powerful data manipulation using
formulae
Size limits – 65535 rows (until
Office 2007)
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Poor support for queries –
searching is slow
No design methodology or
coherence
Can only be updated by one
person at a time
Access Relational data model gives coherence More difficult to use
Very powerful data structuring and
querying
Requires thoughtful use and
advance planning
Safer persistent data (though weaker
than MS SQL Server, ORACLE etc)
Is multi-user: that is, more than one
person at a time can change (update)
the database
Figure 1 Comparative strengths and weaknesses of data storage in two dimensional tables: Microsoft
Office tools
1.2. Web-accessible end user computing A new challenge has arisen in making information readily available within and outside the
organisation. This is the increasing prevalence and expectancy that computerised applications
will be available via the Web: whether internally, on an intranet, or externally on the Internet.
What is novel is that applications built by what some suppliers refer to as "Web-savvy business
users" (and not by information systems professionals) can also be deployed to be Web
accessible. As Cherbakov, L. & A. Bravery & A. Pandya (2007) state:
“
The recent rise of grassroots computing among both professional programmers and
knowledge workers has highlighted a different development approach (our comment:
from SOA, service-oriented architecture, usually applicable to major corporate
systems). In this approach, those who best understand the business problem at hand
develop rapid solutions without the overhead and formality of traditional IT methods.
The new breed of situational applications (SAs), often developed by amateur
programmers in an iterative and collaborative way, shortens the traditional edit-
compile-test-run development life cycle. SAs have the potential to solve immediate
business challenges in a cost-effective way, capturing the part of IT that directly
impacts end users and addressing the areas that were previously unaffordable or of
lower priority.
”
1.3. Research questions addressed in this paper
What Web-accessible applications builders (or situational applications builders) exist, and what are their characteristics?
How can business users (practising professionals and students) evaluate the most appropriate Web-accessible applications builders (or situational applications builders) to employ in a given application context?
1.4. Background to this research: structure of this
paper
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To obtain an answer to these questions, it is first necessary to identify what types of computer
application exist in this area (largely by Web-based secondary research), and to suggest ways
in which they can be evaluated. The paper summarises the tools available. It goes on to
suggest that not only are the applications themselves situational, or specific to the situation; so
is the evaluation of which tool to use. Since this remains research in progress (the questions
have not yet been answered well), it concludes with directions for further research.
Before considering how to make information available outside the organisation, we firstly
recap on spreadsheets and databases before going on to discuss Web application builders, or
situational applications builders, which concentrate on enabling the construction of online
(Web-accessible) spreadsheets and databases.
2. Spreadsheets versus databases Spreadsheets consist of an array of cells, each of which can store a value or a formula. A formula
relates the value of the current cell to other cells which can be considered as exporting their value to be
used in the formula.
Spreadsheets are a very powerful combination of the nearest approach to widely available end-user
computer programming so far invented; and ways of storing (more or less) structured data in which the
relationship between items of data is imposed by the use of formulae.
Databases generally have a more limited remit which they fulfil with greater precision than do
spreadsheets. The most widely accepted, implemented and used type of database is the so-called
“relational” database (Date 2003). He suggests as an informal initial definition that
“
A relational system is one in which the data is perceived by the user as tables (and nothing but
tables); and the operators at the user’s disposal (e.g. for data retrieval) are operators that
generate new tables from old. For example, there will be one operator to extract a subset of the
rows of a table, and another to extract a subset of the columns – and of course a row subset and
a column subset of a table can both be regarded as tables themselves. The reason such systems
are called ‘relational’ is that the term ‘relation’ is essentially just a mathematical term for a
table.
”
It is possible to use spreadsheets and database management systems as the means by which personal
data is stored, in other words, as the means by which a given individual carries out personal information
management. In effect, the computer user who chooses this approach is making her own specialised
lists of data which are important to them. Spreadsheets are also frequently stored on local servers so that
more than one member of a team can use and even update information.
See also http://www.epinions.com/content_972857476 (checked 20/11/2008)
2.1. The role of spreadsheets in business Spreadsheets are very widely used in business at all levels for simple applications like
maintaining lists of staff absences or calculating travel expenses, and also for much more
complex applications such as project planning and management, performance monitoring of
share portfolio and other investments, and general financial and statistical applications.
In part this is because spreadsheet software is present on most business desktops and is
therefore “free” for use by most business staff. However, it is often much better (and less risky)
to use spreadsheets sparingly – for example, while first investigating a need for a computer-
based solution – then to go on to identify and buy a more specialised package which is better
adapted to the business problem.
Ventana Research 2007 op. cit. documents the pervasiveness of spreadsheets, and confirms
their value for processes such as one-off ad hoc reporting and the prototyping of requirements
for what should subsequently be re-engineered into, or acquired ready-made as, formal
applications to support specific management processes.
2.2. Spreadsheet? Database? Or something new? We might advise users that there are many ways of storing data, saying:
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“Each program has specific strengths and weaknesses. You are advised to consider
very carefully who it is that requires what information, who collects the data, what
kind of transformation is required between the input data and the output
information, and then to choose the right program – or programs. A good workman
knows his or her tools, and chooses the appropriate tool for the job.
When you are manipulating data for yourself alone, or as part of a small team, or in a
very small business, spreadsheets are likely to be more intuitive, initially more
productive and easier to get started with. However, as the volumes of data, or the
number of users, increase, databases become much the preferable option. It is often a
sensible and viable option to prototype the requirements for a small business
information system using a spreadsheet, and then, when the requirements are quite
clear, to transfer the data storage element to a database.
”
We might then go on to suggest that in many contexts it is appropriate to make a spreadsheet or
database Web-accessible.
3. Microsoft Access and some of its limitations Relational databases remain the main way in which enterprises store their data. Although other
mechanisms exist for storing business data (notably, content management systems linked with company
websites and intranets), relational databases are critical to the integrity of corporate data and also permit
very general questions to be asked and answered in a focussed and accurate way.
Microsoft Office Access remains probably the most widely-used way to design, create and maintain a
small-scale relational database. Thus, because of their importance in business and the value associated
with being able to use them well, one of our Schools has chosen for several years past to teach relational
database (using Microsoft Access) to first and second-year business students.
Microsoft recognises the importance of Access to many of their customers but they do not recommend
its deployment on the Web, even on an intranet. They would prefer people to use Access as a “front
end” to their more powerful Microsoft SQL Server product, which is in fact free in the Express edition.
However, SQL Server itself is not an end-user product and the whole approach is quite unnecessarily
complicated for business professionals.
3.1. Problems that can arise when using Access 1. A database exists to meet the needs of a community of users. A Microsoft Access
database normally exists on a single client computer. If the computer is on a local
area network (LAN), it is easily accessible to concurrent users -- but only those on the
local network, not across the Web.
2. In order to deploy a simple electronic business application, it is necessary to integrate
a database server with a Web server. This is technically complex and inappropriate
for business professionals to learn.
3. It is possible to deploy Microsoft Access databases so that they can be shared but it is
not straightforward since it necessitates using Microsoft SharePoint Services, on a
Windows Server system.
4. There therefore exists a business and research need to create and deploy small
database applications which are accessible by multiple users via the Web.
4. Databases suitable for end-users We have compiled this list using as a cut-off criterion that it should be possible and straightforward for
business students to learn the software mentioned. In some cases we have proof that this is the case
from our own evaluation; in others, we are accepting the assertion of publishers.
Product Website
Described further below ?
Caspio http://www.caspio.com/ Section Error!
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eference source not found.
cebase http://www.cebase.com/
Coghead http://www.coghead.com/
No – this company ceased trading early in 2009
DabbleDB http://dabbledb.com/
eUnify http://www.eunify.net/
FileMaker Pro http://www.filemaker.com/
Section Error! eference source not found.
Firebird http://www.firebirdsql.org/
Section Error! eference source not found.
Force http://www.salesforce.com/uk/platform/
Section Error! eference source not found.
Iron Speed Designer http://www.ironspeed.com/ Section 0
Kexi http://www.kexi-project.org/
Section Error! eference source not found.
Longjump http://longjump.com/
Section Error! eference source not found.
Microsoft Office Access http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/access/default.aspx
Section 5
Microsoft SQL Server Express http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/express/aa718378.aspx
Section Error! eference source not found.
MyOwnDB http://www.myowndb.com/
MySQL http://www.mysql.com/
Section Error! eference source not found.
OpenOffice.org Base http://www.openoffice.org/product/base.html
Section Error! eference source not found.
PerfectForms http://www.perfectforms.com/
Section Error! eference source not
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found.
Qrimp http://www.qrimp.com/index.html
Section Error! eference source not found.
QuickBase http://quickbase.intuit.com/
Section Error! eference source not found.
Rollbase http://www.rollbase.com/home/index.shtml
TeamDesk http://www.teamdesk.net/ Section 0
TrackVia http://www.trackvia.com/
Webfuser (Inuvia Technologies) http://www.webfuser.com/PortalSite.aspx Section 6.2
WebOffice http://www.weboffice.com/web-database/index.html
Wolf Frameworks http://www.wolfframeworks.com/
Zoho Creator http://db.zoho.com/
Section Error!
eference
source not
found.
5. PC-based databases suitable for end-users
Database Main Characteristics Needs for improvement
Microsoft Office Access Mature technology easy to learn Poor in multi-user applications,
Not web-accessible
Firebird Open source relational database
MySQL Powerful database Need separation from front end
tools
Microsoft SQL Server Express Target for smaller-scale
applications
Kexi Recent open source
development Not web-accessible
OpenOffice.org Base New development based on
HSQLDB Not web-accessible
FileMaker Pro Multi-platform, web-capable Proprietary and expensive
6. Tools which make an existing database
web-accessible Tools that take data from a Microsoft Access database and make it available on the web.
6.1. Iron Speed Designer A software development tool for rapidly developing web-accessible database, forms, and
reporting applications on the basis of an existing database.
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6.2. Webfuser Shares MS Access and similar data sources among users, permits the building of complex
transactional database applications.
7. Approaches which create new web-
accessible databases This approach is distinguished from the previous by the fact that a new database structure is created.
IBM has suggested a new name for this category of simple applications builders: "situational
applications builders". Cherbakov, L. & A. Bravery & A. Pandya (2007) describe situational
applications (SAs) in these terms:
“The recent rise of grassroots computing among both professional programmers and knowledge workers has highlighted a
development approach in which those who best understand the business problem at hand develop rapid solutions without the overhead and formality of traditional IT methods. The new breed of situational applications (SAs), often developed by amateur
programmers in an iterative and collaborative way, shortens the traditional edit-compile-test-run development life cycle. SAs have
the potential to solve immediate business challenges in a cost-effective way, capturing the part of IT that directly impacts end users and addressing the areas that were previously unaffordable or of lower priority.”
They go on to suggest that SAs have as characteristics that they are:
Developed to address the situation at hand
Often built by non-traditional, casual programmers with little up-front emphasis on reliability,
scalability, maintainability, and availability
Habitually use pre-existing software, often created and sourced from a third party via a public
interface
Are developed in short, iterative cycles measured in days or weeks rather than months or years,
focusing on time-to-value
Are usually information-centric
Example products we have identified include:
Product Claims by proprietary
TeamDesk Software as a service
Zoho Tools in the web that can be used to build small applications
Intuit QuickBase Powerful and expensive
Caspio Bridge True relational database
Force Fastest platform for building applications
Longjump Robust platform as a Service
PerfectForms Enables anyone to create web forms. Easily integrated
Qrimp Easy and affordable
8. Evaluation and choice Faced with such a richness of choice, how can business professionals or those who train and educate
such professionals and/or students, choose the right software?
No one tool of the many we have identified (and the many more that we have no doubt failed to
identify) has achieved ubiquity, whether measured in terms of the extent of its use or the generality of
its application.
Further, there is little consensus about the evaluation of information technology or information systems
(Beynon-Davies, P. & Owens, I. (2004)) and comparatively few efforts have been made in this
direction. Models have been developed for Information Systems evaluation (see for example Teevan,
Jaime & William Jones & Benjamin B. Bederson (2006)) in an attempt to specify necessary
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organizational process that reinforce the importance of evaluation and minimize Information Systems
failure; but so far Information Systems evaluation remains underdeveloped and under managed: Love,
P. & Ghoneim, A. (2004).
8.1. Two suggested dimensions of evaluation One is to make a point-by-point comparison of the functionality offered by potentially-
appropriate solutions, weighting the significance of the various functionalities in accordance
with their importance to the proposed application. We identify this dimension as the
"Weighted Functionality Matrix". This gives at least an air of greater objectivity, subject to
the obvious provisos that the weightings are themselves inevitably somewhat subjective, and
the immense practical difficulty of determining whether in fact a particular package offers a
given functionality and to what extent. In practice, such evaluation will often require extensive
trialling, which may be ruled out on the grounds of software availability, time and cost.
A second dimension consists in attempting to identify broader and perhaps also subjective
characteristics of potential solutions. Some at least of these characteristics may in fact have a
significance which endures over time and which transfers between evaluation domains. We
identify this dimension as the "Overall Characteristics".
The table which follows suggests such potential characteristics. Clearly, the choice of these
characteristics is subjective and interpretational.
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Table 1: Overall characteristics of software solutions (a partial list)
Characteristic Meaning Suggested significance for
evaluation
References
Separation of
concerns
The cardinal necessity of
separating different dimensions of
a problem and its solution.
Examples include:
Separating why from what
from how
Dijkstra's view that you
should never do more than
one thing at a time
Separation of concerns is achieved
by delaying commitment as long
as is reasonable during the
analysis, design and
implementation of a software
artefact.
Appropriate separation of concerns
during the design and conception
of a software product remains
visible in the completed artefact
and perhaps even more so in the
documentation of that artefact. The
necessity for complex and
confused documentation will
suggest that the principle has not
been observed.
Furthermore, given that what we
are evaluating here is mechanisms
for end-users to build their own
systems, the separation of concerns
will remain visible in the
completed application’s usability
and usefulness.
Rzevski, George
(1981)
Dijkstra, Edsger
(1982)
Orthogonality Originally, orthogonality is a
system design property facilitating
feasibility and compactness of
complex designs. Orthogonality
guarantees that modifying the
technical effect produced by a
component of a system neither
creates nor propagates side effects
to other components of the system.
The emergent behaviour of a
system consisting of components
should be controlled strictly by
formal definitions of its logic and
not by side effects resulting from
poor integration, i.e. non-
orthogonal design of modules and
interfaces. Orthogonality reduces
testing and development time
because it is easier to verify
designs that neither cause side
effects nor depend on them.
The absence of Orthogonality in
the design and conception of a
software product remains visible in
the completed implementation.
When the designer of the product
has a clear idea of what he is
attempting to achieve, with a clear
and coherent object model, the
eventual software will be easier to
explain to potential users, quicker
for them to learn, and as a result
the software they produce will be
more rapidly and more effectively
applicable.
See for example
Warboys, Brian
(1980)
Methodological
coherence
Identifying a tool does not
guarantee that its use will be
effective. The application of a
hammer to a screw gives poor
results! It is important to choose
appropriate tools, method and
methodology.
The effectiveness of tools cannot
be abstracted from a clear
understanding by their designers of
their context of use. Therefore an
explicit evaluation criterion should
be the methodological clarity and
explicit recognition of the
importance of the process of use
which is demonstrated by the
originators of a software product.
The principles of separation of concerns and of orthogonality may perhaps come together in an
overall architectural or design coherence criterion.
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8.2. Weighted Functionality Matrix and its application The approach we have identified above as the weighted functionality matrix is hardly novel.
Some such approach is frequently employed in the evaluation of supplier offerings by would-
be purchasers.
A practical difficulty which arises is to identify a list of potentially significant functionalities,
and then to obtain the necessary data from the suppliers.
Table 2 shows a deliberately greatly-abridged and slightly-modified extract from a table
published by a consultancy company experienced in offering PaaS services. The full original
was found via http://www.powerinthecloud.com/. The authors offer to make available on
request their developed matrix.
Table 2 Situational Applications functionalities (extract) Caspio Force
Long-jump
Perfect Forms
Quick-Base Qrimp Wolf
Target Users
Business Users/Analysts/Consultants Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
Programmers Y Y Y Y Y Y Y
Database Database Definition
Relationships are handled without having to specify keys Y Y Y Y Y Y Simple validation rules easily specified Y Y Y Y Y Y Y Custom validation rules without coding or scripting Y Y Y Y Local master-detail (i.e. detail table embedded in master) Y Y Y Y Y ? Y Master-detail relationship - 1 level (automatic support) Y Y Y Y ? Y Master-detail relationships - multi-level (automatic support) Y Y Y Y ? Y Automatic master-detail CRUD operations (e.g. cascading deletes) P Y ? Y Roll-up fields (automatic totalling of data from related detail records) P P Y Y Y P Y Default values can be specified conditionally Y Y Y Forms and sub-forms automatically follow entity-relationship model Relationships are inferred automatically from imported data Y Many-to-many relationships automatically resolved with link table Y Supports hierarchy within a single table Y
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8.2.1. Example application: an evaluation of the suitability of database software for Information Systems teaching
The authors have applied the suggested Weighted Functionality Matrix to some of the
products mentioned earlier. We emphasise that the weightings are our own and are
entirely specific to a particular evaluation. In no way do they reflect any overall
evaluation of the power or usefulness of the products mentioned.
We carried out a quasi-quantitative evaluation of the various possible software
offerings, the findings of which appear in the subsequent tables. The evaluation was
based on a qualitative assessment of the strength of a given package against the
criterion, which was converted into a numerical form by using the first table. The
second table gives the result of the evaluation, which is certainly subjective, but
perhaps slightly less so than a purely textual description.
The table which follows is stored in the Excel file C:\R\Gen\Replacing Microsoft
Access.xls
Competing database management software
Notes Consider further?
Free for student use
Ease of learning
Multi-platform: Windows, Linux, Mac
Ease of creating web-accessible data pages
Well-known - adds to a CV
Programmability
Stable and mature
TOTAL
Weighting of this criterion 100%
200%
120%
100%
50%
50%
50%
Alpha Five Proprietary
Well-regarded development environment. Expensive.
No G G G G G G G 0
dBase Proprietary
Corel. Still being developed but a declining user base.
No G G G G G G G 0
Foxpro (later acquired by Microsoft)
Proprietary
Well-regarded development environment. No longer in active development by Microsoft.
No G G G G G G G 0
Omnis Studio RAD tool - not a DBMS. No G G G G G G G 0
Paradox Proprietary
Corel. Still being developed but a declining user base.
No G G G G G G G 0
SQLite Proprietary
Database engine. Runs in-process - is serverless. Very limited end-user tools.
No G G G G G G G 0
Sybase PowerBuilder Proprietary
RAD tool - not a DBMS. No G G G G G G G 0
Firebird Open source
Firebird is an open-source relational database management system offering many ANSI SQL:2003 features. It runs on Linux, Windows, and a variety of Unix platforms. Started as a fork of Borland's open source release of InterBase, the Firebird codebase is maintained by the Firebird Project at SourceForge. Few obvious advantages over Microsoft Access.
Yes A C B E D C D 32,6
PostgreSQL Open source
Very powerful, a bit difficult to use. Needs separate front-end tools such as SQL Maestro for PostgreSQL (chargeable) to make it usable by business students.
Yes A D B D C E A 33,1
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Oracle XE (Express Edition) Proprietary
Express Edition, introduced in 2005, offers Oracle 10g free to distribute on Windows and Linux platforms (with a footprint of only 150 MB and restricted to the use of a single CPU, a maximum of 4 GB of user data and 1 GB of memory). Support for this version comes exclusively through on-line forums and not through Oracle support. Difficult to use for business students.
Yes B D B D A E A 34,1
MySQL Open source
Very powerful, a bit difficult to use. Needs separate front-end tools such as SQL Maestro for MySQL (chargeable) to make it usable by business students. Commonly coupled with PHP, a powerful and fairly approachable programming language; widely used in small and medium enterprises.
Yes B D B D B B B 35,6
Microsoft SQL Server Express Proprietary
Microsoft SQL Server Express is the freely-downloadable and distributable version of Microsoft's SQL Server relational database management system. It offers a database solution specifically targeted for embedded and smaller-scale applications.
Yes A C E B B C B 37,2
Kexi Open source
Open source development, designed to compete with Microsoft Access and based on SQLite. At an early stage in its development. Does not currently support web access. Offers no obvious advantages over Access.
Yes A B B E E E E 38,1
Microsoft Access Proprietary
Well understood, mature technology. Easy to learn. Scales poorly in multi-user applications and is difficult to make web-accessible.
Yes B A E C A C B 44,2
OpenOffice.org Base Open source
Open source development, based on HSQLDB. At an early stage in its development.
Yes A B A D B B D 49
FileMaker Pro (formerly Claris Filemaker)
Proprietary
Strong product, multi-platform, web-capable "out of the box", but proprietary and expensive. 30-day free trial in various languages.
Yes E A B A C C A 49,6
Table 4 Competing database management software
Licence Free for student use
Ease of learning
Multi-platform: Windows, Linux, Mac
Ease of creating web-accessible data pages
Well-known - adds to a CV
Program-mability
Stable and mature
TOTAL
Weighting of this criterion 100% 200% 120% 100% 50% 50% 50%
Firebird Open source
A C B E D C D 32,6
MySQL Open source
B D B D B B B 35,6
Microsoft SQL Server Express
Proprietary A C E B B C B 37,2
Kexi Open source
A B B E E E E 38,1
Microsoft Access Proprietary B A E C A C B 44,2
OpenOffice.org Base
Open source
A B A D B B D 49,0
FileMaker Pro Proprietary E A B A C C A 49,6
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8.3. Overall characteristics of software solutions We have suggested above that there may well be very significant evaluation criteria which do
not correspond to specific functionalities, such as Architectural or Design coherence and
Methodological coherence. These are very difficult to identify and describe, let alone use as
evaluation criteria. We would also caution that an excessive concern for design purity is often
associated with tools and approaches which appeal to academics and which fail totally in the
much more pragmatic marketplace. Nevertheless, we feel that they may be very significant in
the levels of productivity achieved with tools which meet those criteria either very well or not
so well. We intend investigating this aspect empirically and experimentally.
Other Overall Characteristics need yet to be identified. One which may be particularly
significant is the “supplier lock-in” which occurs when an organisation commits to the sort of
service described in this paper.
9. Conclusions We have reviewed PC-based databases and the emergence of Web-accessible situational applications.
We have suggested the need for systematic evaluation of these new approaches and concluded that just
as the applications created are situational, so too is the evaluation – in part. These interim conclusions
also set an agenda for further research, both into the effectiveness of the applications discussed and into
new methods for evaluating them.
Concerning our research questions, we can draw interim conclusions:
What Web-accessible applications builders (or situational applications builders) exist, and what are their characteristics?
We have presented a non-exhaustive list of such tools which has
concentrated on commercially-available tools. We have here presented a
small subset of the functionalities we have identified and against which our
ongoing research is continuing to evaluate these tools.
How can business users (practising professionals and students) evaluate the most appropriate Web-accessible applications builders (or situational applications builders) to employ in a given application context?
We have shown how we evaluate functionalities using a Weighted
Functionality Matrix, and we have hinted at the difficulty involved in
obtaining the necessary data from tool suppliers.
We have suggested significant Overall Characteristics of applications.
In subsequent research, we shall refine the list of such characteristics as we
experiment in the use of specific applications builders in specific situations.
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