Hello again,
I have now completed my initial asessment of what i need in the way of a user definable database.
If anyone is interested in seeing the outline specification document please email me at vincent_ohare@hotmail.com and i will send a copy.
Basically, my requirement is to have a database containing tables comprising fields of three types:-
Category 1. - Plain Field
Category 2. - Field with Pick List
Category 3. - Field with a lookup relationship to another database table
My initial asessment of the UDT is that it might not be suitable for my requirement for the following reasons:
a) It looks like it is a highly generic/convoluted 'three (or 4?) table' solution, capable of handling many 'tables' and 'records', but without actually having any physical tables or records (if you know what I mean?). I am concerned that this might present challenges to both developers and users (System Administrators) trying to query and report from the system.
b) I can't work out where the UDT tool stores its data and i suspect it is not in SQL Server, but may be in XML files. As my application could easily contain 50,000 records, i feel that i need the indexing and resilliance of SQL Server.
So, I think i am a bit off course, looking at UDT.
I have therefore widened the search for a suitable user definable database component and have come across www.cookDNN.com and the Universal List tool. Universal List creates physical SQL Server Tables and also supports links between tables and indexing of large tables. It seems to be more in line with my requirement. So I plan to invesigate Universal List, moving forward.
Regards
Vince.