Hi guys been a while since I been here. I have come upon a new project and need some help; so here goes.
Scenerio: I am building a database for a towing company. My database will send the tow request to the truck that will do the tow, Track mileage and time (for billing), And make invoices and receipts available to the customer at time of service, and track payments.
The infrastructure is an MS Access Solution. It is a split database with the back end behind SQL Server. Each tow truck will have a laptop that is connected to the internet, running the front end, and a mobile printer.
To my surprise, much of this is really pretty easy. I incorporated a lot of the security seminar concepts. Each remote computer works beautifully except on 1 goal.
I am having a difficult time trying to get the dispatch screen to the remote computer in the manner I want to make it work.
I had no problem getting the front end database to pull the information from the table. This is ok, but there are a couple of aspects I do not like about it. One problem is there are too many calculations. My client is worried about data usage in the vehicles, using this method. I also think it will slow down the works quite a bit if all these computers are constantly running a requery on the table. Finally, I hate using timers. I think they are clumbsy and open the door for errors to happen.
What I would like instead, is for the dispatch Front End to push the tow request out. Basically, when the request is taken, the dispatcher will assign a driver to handle the tow, the dispatch computer will find the tow truck that the request has been assigned to, and open a screen on the appropriate computer that has all the pertinent information (47 run-on sentences, I know but it is late hahaha). In effect, I want it to work in the context of an instant messenger. Any thoughts?