Databases

LINKING TO DATA

WEB-ENABLED DATABASE CONNECTIVITY: A COMPARISON OF PROGRAMMING, SCRIPTING, AND APPLICATION-BASED ACCESS
SHAE JANSONS has worked with information systems for 14 years, and earned her M.S. in management information systems from Governors State University in University Park, Illinois. Her research interests include Internet and Ecommerce applications and programming. GARY J. COOKearned his Ph.D. in management information systems at Arizona State University, Tempe, and his M.B.A. at California State University, Fresno. His research interests include E-commerce, decision support systems, and human–computer interactions.

Shae Jansons and Gary J. Cook
Legacy databases represent a valuable repository of stored knowledge that could prove useful if made available to abroader audience via Internet applications. This article provides a framework that will assist managers in reviewing and selecting appropriate techniques for integrating their legacy database systems with Web technology, based on their particular needs, resources, and constraints. In general, for smaller organizations with lower levels of expertise, relatively few data requests, and many resourceconstraints, scripting can provide a method of accessing a legacy database and publishing it via a Web-enabled application in the most cost-efficient method. For larger organizations with more resources, or for applications where a number of data requests are expected, an implementation using a Web application server such as Allaire ColdFusion is recommended. For organizations with detailed, highlyspecialized requirements or mission-critical information, a programming approach using Java/JDBC (perhaps in conjunction with XML) should be considered.

egacy databases represent a valuable repository of stored knowledge that could prove useful if made available to a broader audience via Internet applications. The audience might consist of cus-

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tomers, suppliers, employees, researchers,or governmental agencies, for example, accessing dynamic Web pages containing catalogs, inventories, research studies, or reports produced as needed from current database

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LINKING TO DATA

Webenabled application using client/server architecture can optimize network protocols and memoryrequirements.

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sources. The Internet and World Wide Web allow organizations to provide access to this legacy data while using new presentation techniques. The advantages of a Web-enabled database are many. An accessible, searchable database can provide opportunities for news, teaching, learning, research; enable online booking and catalog services; facilitate E-commerce; provide online support; improveproductivity; reduce training needs; reduce costs; increase revenue; and enable information sharing among a company’s employees or partners. Web-enabled database applications can be run on intranets (private internal networks), extranets (private networks that allow links to other trusted private networks, usually business partners), or the Internet, all of which use client/server architecture.There are several factors that encourage publishing legacy database files to Webenabled applications. 1. Web technology is widely distributed (and becoming more so every day). 2. Web technology uses an open architecture and is platform independent. Many people — some with Macs, some with Windows platforms, and others with UNIX/Linux machines — can all access the same information in a HypertextMarkup Language (HTML) page via a Web browser without difficulty. 3. Web-enabled applications are easy to use, having familiar Windows look-and-feel graphical user interfaces (GUIs). 4. From an organizational perspective, a Web-enabled application using client/server architecture can optimize network protocols and memory requirements. In client/server architecture, functionality (and therefore,...