Analysis skills
Affordable
information has scoped and designed over 50
applications in the 5 years. For all of these
programs we provide at minimum 4 documents. A
master Estimate, a Schedule, a Program Flow
Chart and most importantly, an
Entity-Relationship Diagram. We will not start
programming on a job until we are comfortable
with all of the information included on these
analysis documents. Analyzing a database system
correctly is critical to a working finished
product and a happy client. We have been
creating these same analysis documents since
1995.
User Interface Design
Many of the systems we are
asked to work on are DOS applications that already exist.
Many of these character-based systems are
difficult and inefficient to use. We have read
many books on GUI design and development, but
the best training has been in creating database
applications. User interfaces should be obvious
to use, and force the user to respect the
integrity of the data the system stores. Rogan
Jones has been creating Windows programs since
1984 when the first Macintosh 128K computer
appeared. Brad Rose has a degree in Industrial
Engineering with a heavy emphasis on user
interface design.
Database Design
Our experience in this
category dates back to 1992. Besides using our
database design skills in all of the systems we
have programmed, we have taken many courses in
Data Modeling and Normalization. These classes
included ORACLE 101 where for 5 days students
learn how to build a complete Data Model from
verbal business rules. Other experience has been
gained by being exposed to many legacy systems
throughout the Texaco and now Shell enterprises.
Seeing flawed data structures and where
programmers made normalization mistakes has been
the best way for us to avoid errors.
MS Access
We have been using MS Access since 1993
when version 1.0 became version 1.1. Both
programmers have taken courses on MS Access in
the past, and Rogan Jones taught 6 weeks of
Access 2.0 classes in 1994. Affordable
Information started using Access 8.0 in late
1996 to prepare Texaco Puget Sound for their NT
network. By mid 1997 we had converted all of
their 16 bit Access and Visual Basic 3.0 front
ends to Access 97. Since that time we have built
a Bank Ranking System in Access 97 for Moss
Adams and a complete accounting package for
Anacortes Yacht Charters Inc., as well as a
dynamic Active Server Page interface for a large
Access 97 drawing management system. We
are now offering Access2000 applications and
conversions to.
Web Solutions
We have been programming
Intranet and Internet Application Solutions for
over 5 years. Our applications range from
the E*Doc Document Management System to On-line
insurance transcription programs to the
DataConsolidator which displays data from
multiple data sources on one browser
screen. Since all of our Web solutions are
programmed on the server, they are browser
indifferent. Our skill and experience in
web solutions make Affordable Information Inc. a
front runner in web invation and application
development.
