On Wed, 2011-09-14 at 19:17 -0700, Craig White wrote: ... snip interesting posting .... > WebApps are clearly the future - it's hard to justify specialized > server/client applications (installation, limited choice of clients, > maintenance, licensing) and it seems that the future will offer 2 > choices... SAAS or run your own. That is the way I see things. Web runs anywhere. Otherwise specific application software (usually costing money), licensing involvement, software dependency etc. Grab a reasonable browser and start using the application! > My own take on it... 'plain html' accounting is just fine. Mine are a bit more than 'plain'. I use CSS. However accounting is basically entering or capturing the data; then doing basic tasks like orders, invoices, statements etc. Add some complicated things like credit control and specific discount structures for individual customers. Branch-out in to name, address and other contract details, add the mailing list facility. Add stock control, automatic re-ordering etc. The best bits that make the directors happy is when they can sit in front of the screen and see the sales figures and trends. Everything summarised on a single page with more detailed analyse with a simple click. Think Gmagic, or perhaps Imagic, may be able to plot on a HTML screen. Have headings in a language file, so international customisation becomes easier. Add an access control system allowing users to access different modules and menus. OK one can't (yet?) plug-in a bar code reader to a web application but an interface box can transmit the data using TCP. > To keep the PHP reasonably secure, it requires HTTPS and > access authorization is done by LDAP authz so if you don't have a > username and password on his system, you can't get the login screen. Of > course the server is kept up to date. Agreed. Security with HTTPS and non-standard ports not 443, 8000, 8080 etc. Currently use static IPs to prevent unauthorised access. > As for Paul's expressed notions... It would take a fairly massive amount > of man hours to produce a fully functional dual entry accounting package > for widespread business use. I think the essential thing is sheer inspirational brain work carefully thinking about everything before stating to code. Get the structure and the objectives correct and the rest is a piece of cake. And be prepared to modify. > Before you decide on an environment, you > would probably want to commit to test driven development and MVC which > almost invites the use of a framework (Cake/Django/RoR). Personally I am > biased towards RoR but starting a large scale project in ruby, php or > python without using one of the frameworks at this point would be a > really poor choice. There are a number of PHP based accounting systems > out there which you could probably fork but why? They all missed the > boat somewhere, somehow. Unsure what you mean by 'framework'. Simple to write, harder to ensure everything integrates well. Probably 3 to 4 months part-time. Easy and intuitive to use and delivering what the users want plus scope for customisation. -- With best regards, Paul. England, EU.