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Specifying a databaseOur clients come from a range of backgrounds and we have received many different styles of specification. Some are more helpful than others. If you're a database user then the following hints might help you when you specify your next database. If you're a database developer then they'll help you be more helpful to your client:
If database development can proceed in smaller steps then your developer can work with you to make sure that each step is sound before making the next one. A useful analogyWe have just paid a plumber and his assistant several thousand pounds to refit our central heating system. I trained as an engineer and am quite capable of cutting and bending pipes and soldering them together but I was persuaded to call in the experts for this job. That was a good decision because this pair did the job well and were finished in less than a week. It would have taken me a month of weekends.We did not specify the location of the radiators beforehand because the plumber needed to see how the existing pipes had been run before he could tell us the best place for the radiators. If we had given strict instructions then the system would have cost us even more money. Whilst they were working I stayed out of their way. If they wanted a decision like 'Where would you like this radiator?' then I gave them a quick answer and went back to the office without offering any more advice. Telling them how to do their job would have upset them and they would not have been as cooperative or helpful. Treat your database developer like we treated our plumbers:
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Hints & tips
The textbox class in Visual FoxPro 9 has a new Autocomplete
property which shows the user the previous values that have
been entered in that textbox.
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