At 12:31 PM 4/24/97 -0600, you wrote:
>Here are some questions I have about developing such a system in
>Access:
>
We haven't developed a proposal database in Access, but I've been using it
for a while for other purposes and think it's a good choice (I say that
having never used any other database product, so I can't give you any
comparisons).

My thoughts:

Integration with the other Microsoft Office products is easy (if you're
familiar with the data sharing tools in the other applications), with lots
o' built-in aids.  If you're using Word & Excel, you can leave the data in
Access and pull data from the Access tables to use in spreadsheets &
documents, without having to make a copy of the data.  The most recent
version also offers great web integration.

One problem with the Office97 and Office95 versions is that they are not
compatible with v2.0, for Windows 3.1--so someone running v2.0 will not be
able to work with a database developed in Access95 or 97.  The solution is
to put a web server on the machine that houses the database and share the
application over the web.  If you're thinking about EDI questions, I assume
you have plans to make the database available on the web.  Access can also
use data in higher-end applications, like Oracle.

As for reports, it does take a while to get used to the system, and it
could be made easier, but if you're more comfortable in Word you can do
your reports as Word merge files using the Access data.

Overall I'd use Access simply because of Microsoft's plans to integrate the
web into all of their products (or maybe because they already control my
thoughts and I don't really have a choice).

Good luck-
Kevin

----------
Kevin Crosby
Office of Sponsored Programs & Research
DePaul University
http://www.depaul.edu/~kcrosby/ospr.html