Access has been around for nearly 20 years now, and like Cobol, evolution has slowed to a crawl. You might say that Access 2010/2013 is a sign of evolution, but let's be honest. 2010/2013 contains two apps - one for client development, and one for SharePoint form/list design. They share the same skin, but fundamentally diverge in terms of design decisions and capability.
Microsoft has done a great job with Access web services for SharePoint users, provided people try not to compare the Access web capability with the client capability, and you don't look at Access web services as a solution for enterprise-grade web capabilities. But what about the "legacy" side of Access, the one hundreds of thousands of databases use?
My answer is, for better or worse, it's time for us to start transitioning. In the same way that a lot of really bright COBOL programmers I know have done, we have to realize that the opportunity space for MS Access is shrinking. The need for rapidly developed, business-user friendly database applications will never go away. But the number of places Access will be used will continue to decline, and what I'd be curious to hear from readers is where you think people will go to solve the problem?
2 comments:
MS Access serves some purposes of programming or rapid development. but its future is (in my opinion) governed by 2 things :
1) MS Access enables programmers to create fairly good applications. However as the development cycle progresses these apps will sooner need to go on the web; and here is where i think most people drop MS ACCESS and start re-doing their project to be web-enabled ( and i do mean a full blown web capability, AST.NET or PHP ... etc) not SharePoint.
2) Secondly, the future of MS ACCESS will be highly based on the decesion of Microsoft management. the 2007 version came out with signicant changes; this was a good push to MS ACCESS. I think Microsoft have to set future direction to make MS ACCESS " THE MINI DEVELOPMENT" by providing all capabilities; desktop development and web. The product can be used in schools to teach programming, in colleges ... etc. The link with SharePoint gives web content but is very limited. MS ACCESS can be the solution for any one looking to make a web application; but doesn't want to go through the hassle of learning C sharp, .NET and the whole 9 yards.
Regards
Ayman ,
iymanb@gmail.com
@iymanb
SQLite and and various front ends.
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