Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

D. Bruce Moore — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 01:16:54 GMT

I would love to hear about the challenges of merging Ruby and Access! Any chance of getting details?

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Russell Sinclair — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 01:22:37 GMT

One thing that we at M7 have added to the mix since Ryan left is using a Ruby XML feed to drive data into Access. The online application used some interesting methods to get around dynamic field population and application versioning. The Unspace group provided us with an XML feed that simplified the data structure for us so that we could simply load XML datasets using ADO and bring the data into access tables. Where we used queries on linked tables before, we have now moved to loading data using XML feeds.

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

AlexDybenko — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 11:06:20 GMT

Hi,

doing the same approach, but using ASP.NET and Telerik controls. Of course, not so easy as in Access, but it looks and functions almost the same way, customers like this, can easy switch from web to access and back

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Garry Robinson — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 13:39:10 GMT

Great that Ryan jumped to the Access team, his experiences with the Web and Access will be terrific. When I was in Seattle, Ryan inspired me to get into MSXML so that I could talk to basecamphq. I am building a really useful invoicing system called ThickToast that works with Basecamp. See picture www.thicktoast.com

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Zac Woodall — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 06:30:09 GMT

What Gary said. It is great to have Ryan on board. Attitudes are changing around here... traditional software isn't, well, traditional anymore. People like Ryan are beginning to crop up here and there, and I think us oldschoolers are more receptive to their ideas now than we have been at any point in the past.

For those who are looking, Ryan's influence will be clearly apparent in Access 14.

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Mark Jones — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 15:11:54 GMT

I'd like to hear more about the Ruby on Rails integration. We have a web interface for our Access app (ASP and ASP.NET), but because our back end is SQL Server it communicates directly with the data on the server, so it doesn't actually 'integrate' with the Access app at all.

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Steve Goldring — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 16:24:14 GMT

If I understand Russell correctly, the Access front end no longer maintains a direct connection to the back end. ADO (in Access VBA?) is used to consume XML fed from the web. Apparently the Access application does not need to share any data with the web - it merely consumes what the web feeds it.

If this is correct, there's nothing too special here. I look forward "in the coming weeks" to other examples. I'm interested to hear about using Access as a front end to a SQL Server database (for example) on a website - where both the website and the Access database work with the SQL data. Or is this, architecturally, simply a bad idea?

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Ryan McMinn — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 01:20:45 GMT

Hey Steve, The factor site also does what you mention using Access as a front end for a web hosted MYSQL server (works just as well with MSSQL). The latest post about releaseme.ca is the same model where both the Rails app and Access talk to the same web hosted database.

Access &amp; Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

re: Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services

Access & Ruby on Rails: Software + Services