Your Source for Microsoft Access Migration in Pennsylvania

We regularly interact with clients who have outgrown critical applications which were built using Microsoft Access. It’s a common story because Access is a handy tool which non-IT users love to use to quickly put together a small application. However, the company grows, the number of users expand, the data expands, and a day comes when everyone realizes it’s time to move up to enterprise-grade software.

CSSI’s experienced software development team can assist you in achieving a successful migration, upgrading your software to a more robust platform. But first… why migrate?

Why Migrate From Legacy Access Applications?

Perhaps the question is more ‘when’ than ‘why’. MS Access is a handy DIY solution until it isn’t. What are some of the factors which may cause you to realize you’ve outgrown Access?

1. Your business requires a more robust database — this is the basic catch-all answer. The relatively simple Access solution was the right choice at one point, but changes and growth in your business are causing you to run up against the limits of Access, which can no longer grow with your business
2. Multi-user environment — you may have started with a single user, but as the business grew, you started to have multiple users. This causes a cascading set of issues with Access, chief among these, a slower performing application.
3. Users in more than one location / geographically dispersed users — while you may have once operated from a single location, now you have multiple locations and/or mobile users who need on-demand application accessibility.
4. Need for an improved front-end — If you have need for more control, options, and features in the front end of your application, you may realize that Access no longer fits the task.
5. Microsoft Access is somewhat obsolete — While it is not true that Microsoft intends to end Access, it is true that the world of software development has changed over the years. There are now a broad range of tools which can be used to create ‘programming-lite’ applications, and immediately solve many of the shortcomings of Access. In short, you have more choices today – CSSI would be happy to help you evaluate.
6. You’d like to make use of web development and a cloud environment such as a MS Azure SQL database or AWS.
7. Security is a growing concern. With a more robust front end and SQl server back end, we can improve your overall security.
8. Application performance speed has deteriorated as the program has become more complex.
9. Database size has expanded dramatically — You may have started off with a relatively small amount of data, but over the years, data has grown and slowed down your app performance — time to consider a data migration project.
10. You wish to have remote users with mobile devices connect to your application. CSSI can help with applications well suite to mobile device usage.

Not convinced? Check out: 10 reasons why IT pros hate Microsoft Access

CSSI Database Migration Service and Application Rewrite

For an application or database migration away from Access, there are 3 options which Microsoft partner CSSI can propose:

1) Maintain your existing Access front-end, and migrate the target database to the more robust Microsoft SQL server.

2) Perform the Microsoft Access database migration and also use the migration process to rewrite/redesign the application front-end with a more robust framework.

3) Migrate your application to a light-code application solution. In some situations, depending on your application and migration scenario, we may recommend using a rapid application development tool.

Contact CSSI today to discuss Access database migration.