I know that this could be a wide-open question, but I hope that I can get some constructive feedback about a project I’m working with.
We have a relational database developed in Access. It’s not terribly complicated, but it does involve around a dozen tables. As is often the case, there are those who want to see if it can be ported to SharePoint and use views instead of reports.
Aside from the huge amount of difficulty I have had porting even simple, flat Access apps to SharePoint, I wonder what compromises can be reached. For example, can it remain an Access database and yet have some of the reports accessible in real time via SharePoint? (One of the biggest advantages, ostensible, would be SharePoints security, which seems as easy as Access; seems arcane.)
What management (those who just want it done!) would like to see is a list of reports in their SharePoint collaboration site, which they can just click on and view and print. The more technical minded want to see if it could leverage security so that only those with the correct permissions could get in and enter/edit data.
Would any of you have some time to give me some (experienced) feedback about what is possible, what MIGHT be possible, and what would be just way too hard. We don’t want a huge development effort for this, and I haven’t found any “real world” information that seems to address the difficulties we’ve been facing (such as turning Reports into views, maintaining relationships between SharePoint lists.)
Your two cents?
