SouthWare Database Director™

SouthWare is a general purpose accounting system that is that has modules that adapt it for service industries such as equipment sales and service companies. It is useful in companies from around $3 million to $200 million in annual sales. Even though it offers a rich selection of over 300 standard reports, it has many features that make it easier to learn and easier to use than the other "HIGH END" systems with which it compares. It is completely modular but still completely integrated. It runs on a broad base of operating environments and platforms.

Choose the Best Data Format for You!

Which Data Format is Best?

• Cost
• Speed of processing
• Speed/ease of analysis
• Complexity
• Reliability
• Security
• Portability

You demand a lot from your business system. Choosing a database format for your business data is important because it impacts the cost of your system, the speed of processing, the ease of data analysis, the complexity and reliability of your system, and the security and portability of your data. No single database is tops in all these areas, so if you're going to go with a single format you'll have to decide what you're willing to live without.

Does all business software limit you to one data format?

Do you have to live with a single format? Do all business systems limit you to one of the data formats so that if you want to use a different format you have to get a completely different set of software?

Not if you use the SouthWare Excellence Series!

With the SouthWare Excellence Series built on Acucorp technology you can choose from among the leading database formats for your data. You can use a fast portable format such as Vision ISAM or a sophisticated database management system such as Microsoft SQL Server or Oracle. And with SouthWare's Database Director you can mix and match database formats within on set of data!

How does this work? The Database Director allows you to selectively choose the database format for specific files. You might use a speedy ISAM structure for normal transaction files but choose an easily-analyzed relational database format for your history files. Or choose both for the same file by specifying that you want a replicate(duplicate) file to be interactively maintained in an alternate format. To utilize SQL-oriented formats you license Acu4GL for one or more of the supported formats. The actual format of the data is managed by the technology and the programs simply work with the resulting data without caring what format it is in.

Selectable Data Format per File

• Default format is vision, a fast, portable ISAM structure
• Other formats include:
  
  
  • Microsoft SQL Server*
  • Oracle and Sybase and Informix and DBMaker (for history files)*
  • Btrieve
  • C-ISAM
  • generic ODBC*
    
    * requires Acu4GL™ Licensing

By default SouthWare uses Vision format which is a speedy, reliable, and portable data system. The other formats shown here are options you can use with a single file, several files, or for all permanent files. You'll have to license other software to use these other options which makes them more costly than using Vision alone, but the advantages of these other file systems may be well worth the extra investment. The key point here is that you have the option to use these systems as needed while continuing to use standard SouthWare programs.

Visual Management of Files

• Database Director View lets you view and edit file information for entire database
• Select files by Application, file Status, file system format, current replication
• Options to:
  
  
  • Edit file status info
  • Display file statistics
  • Convert to different format (switch formats)
  • Copy data to a file/format (one-time copy)
  • Create New Replicate File
  • Recreate Existing Replicate file Data
  • Check/Rebuild Vision file
  • Refresh View

Database Director has a view screen that makes it easy for you to see and edit the information for each file or table in your system. You can selectively display a list of files and then select any file from the list to review or change.

Options you have from the Database Director view include the info stored about the file's status/format, displaying statistics, switching to a different file format, making a copy of a file in a different format, creating or rebuilding replicate files, or rebuilding Vision files.

Replication Option

• Create/maintain a duplicate file in another name/format
• May maintain up to nine replicates of a file
• Option to customize replication via custom program without changing standard program

Replication is a very valuable feature in many situations. With replication you can create a duplicate file(up to nine of them) that stores the same data as your standard file. The SouthWare programs will automatically duplicate each change made to the standard file in your replicate file(s). By replicating in a different format such as a SQL database you get the benefit of Vision files for your normal processing but the powerful analysis of relational databases with your SQL replicate file. You even have the option to write a program to customize the data replication without modifying standard SouthWare programs.

Why is Database Director so different?

• You get uniquely flexible options for use of SQL database technology.
  
  • Choose from database formats such as Vision ISAM, Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle and Sybase (for history files), Btreive, C-ISAM, and generic ODBC
• You don't have to put all your eggs in one database basket because you can choose a format now and change to a different on late without impacting your investment in SouthWare software, training, and data.
• You can mix multiple formats within the same set of data files
  
  • You have the option to choose the format per SouthWare file to achieve your best balance of power, speed, and afford ability.
• You can easily convert files from one database to another
  
  • With Database Director you get a built-in utility to convert data from any of the supported formats to any of the other supported formats. You can do this as a one-time process (to create a copy of a file) or as part of a switch to a different format.
• You can replicate a file that is maintained interactively
  • Each time a SouthWare program updates the standard file a parallel process may also update the replicate file (e.g.-use Vision for normal processing but maintain a parallel history file in Oracle for data mining and analysis)
• You can even rebuild a Replicate File from the normal file
  
  • If you are maintaining a replicate file and have a system problem that causes the replicate to get out of sync with the standard file you can easily rebuild the replicate file from the standard data.

Let's review why the SouthWare Excellence Series with Database Director gives you much more value than software that allows only a single format for its data.

You get to choose the database format that makes sense for your business right now without that becoming the primary reason for picking a particular set of business software. If you need relational database capability you can have it. If you want to save money and reduce complexity use Vision for your data - you can access it via ODBC tools if you wish.

If your needs change in the future you have the option to switch to a different format without changing business software! Your operator training, procedures, flow of data, etc. remain the same. Data format is a technology issue and your people shouldn't have to learn a whole new set of software just because you need to switch to a different data format.

Because you can choose the file format per file you can get the best combination of features from multiple data formats. For example, analyzing a history file is a great use of a relational database, but updating a simple transaction file may be slower with a relational database than it is with an ISAM structure such as Vision. With Database Director you can store your history file as a relational database table and your transaction file as an ISAM file.

Converting data from one format to another is a simple job with Database Director. If you want to switch to another format simply get everyone off of the system, tell Database Director to convert the data to a file in the new format, then have everyone log on again. They will now be working with the file in the new format!

Replication gives you the ability to keep your standard file processing simple while maintaining replicate files in other formats. If you need an Oracle version of your sales history file you can maintain it as a replicate. Then if system update problems ever get you Oracle file out of sync with the standard history you can use Database Director to rebuild the replicate from the standard data.

Let us design a system for your business!

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