Before you get all hot and sweaty, this message comes under the heading: In
My Humble Opinion (IMHO)
My contribution to this discussion was going to be limited to:
"Call me, I can build you one..."
But then this piece of (useless) information landed in my box, so as an IT
professional I feel required to respond to this piece of mis-information.
(See notice at top of message!)
The response provided is equivalent to:
I know, we'll use Word to run our business, it has tables, with a bit of
Visual Basic we can make it perform generic cash register tasks, and using
Save as HTML we can make our website. I'm sure that there are things I've
forgotten, but we'll deal with those as we go, since we're using a simple
tool, the problems will only be simple.
Another way of saying this is: "When your only tool is a hammer, every
problem looks like a nail."
A more useful approach to this discussion is to ask questions that give you
an idea of the user requirements. Just stating the bits doesn't help. Is it
going to sell low-cost, high volume items, such as hamburgers, or is it
going to sell high-cost, low-volume items, such as a Sydney Harbour Bridge.
Some other questions to ask would be:
- When do you need this by?
- How much money does your business plan allow for this solution?
- Will there be local expertise?
- Does it have to be Macintosh because of other reasons?
- How will it be connected to the Internet?
- How will you deal with products on the shelf in the store being sold online?
Notice that none of these questions actually deal with *which* solution
you're actually going to implement. Also notice that this comes under the
heading "Some other questions", eg, there are more to ask.
Now if the respondent was pointing out that the original question provided
insufficient detail to be able to respond with a real answer and was
attempting to show this by their response, I can only say: "Sorry mate, I
missed that completely."
At 09:42 30/11/01 +0800, Matthew Healey wrote:
On 30/11/01 2:45 AM, "Antony N. Lord" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> An associate of mine is starting a new business
>
> * It will have a shop front
> * It will also sell via the Internet
>
> What we need is
>
> * A point of sale (register) system
> combined with
FileMaker Pro
> * Database / stock inventory / ordering
> which in turn can be linked with
FileMaker Pro
> * On-line web catalog with "as real time as possible" stock levels
FileMaker Pro
> Can anyone recommend product(s) they have USED in similar circumstances?
>
> I can think of several ways already (using existing stand alone but
> less integrated / automated applications) but figured there must be
> software designed specifically for this purpose.
>
> Looking forward to (one day) offering WAMUGers a discount :)
Can we see a pattern here?
:P
1. Start with OSX. Don't even bother with OS9 as a server platform.
2. Talk to people that have done it before. The Zytech and Express PowerMac
guys should be able to help you out. (Hi Keith & Rob!)
3. Google is your friend. http://www.google.com
4. There are LOTS of people using FileMaker on this list, for exactly the
same thing you are doing!
Regards
Matthew Healey
--
Matthew Healey
Information Systems
Western Orthopaedic Clinic
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Phone: +61 (08) 9423 8800
Fax: +61 (08) 9381 8300
Suite 213
25 McCourt Street
Subiaco 6006
Western Australia
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