Can smartphone upload to a web based database?

[Guest glenn69]

Hello,

I am trying to establish a system in our office in which our field reps have some sortof handheld device (smartphone, etc) in which they enter basic data concerning their daily stops. The information would then need to be sent to our company's database.

How can this be done? With what equipment?

[Guest nausea]

Hello,

I am trying to establish a system in our office in which our field reps have some sortof handheld device (smartphone, etc) in which they enter basic data concerning their daily stops. The information would then need to be sent to our company's database.

How can this be done? With what equipment?

This can be accomplished fairly easily. You have a few choices.

First, you have the choice of which device to use. Each having pros and cons. You can pretty much use any device (phone, smartphone, pocket pc, palm, blackberry, etc) that has the ability to establish a data connection (GPRS, EDGE, CDMA 1X, EVDO, etc).

[note: I'm assuming you're looking for a real-time over-the-air solution. You can also record the data on the device and then sync it with computers at your office when you return.]

Second, you need to decide how you want the to perform the database updates. You can either have a client application on the device which connects to a web application on your company's application server or you can develop a website based solution where you would write a website (in PHP, ASP, etc) that the device could load via its web browser and enter information on forms on the website.

Alternatively, you can use the device to send emails to someone who would check the email and manually make the updates to the database. Or even just call into the office and give the info :)

Where are you located? What devices and services are available to you?

I would proabably (need more info to make a more informed choice) recommend looking into using BlackBerries if they're available to you. They're stable, secure, fast and reliable. Does your company already have any devices in use?

Edited May 30, 2006 by nausea

[Guest glenn69]

This can be accomplished fairly easily. You have a few choices.

First, you have the choice of which device to use. Each having pros and cons. You can pretty much use any device (phone, smartphone, pocket pc, palm, blackberry, etc) that has the ability to establish a data connection (GPRS, EDGE, CDMA 1X, EVDO, etc).

[note: I'm assuming you're looking for a real-time over-the-air solution. You can also record the data on the device and then sync it with computers at your office when you return.]

Second, you need to decide how you want the to perform the database updates. You can either have a client application on the device which connects to a web application on your company's application server or you can develop a website based solution where you would write a website (in PHP, ASP, etc) that the device could load via its web browser and enter information on forms on the website.

Alternatively, you can use the device to send emails to someone who would check the email and manually make the updates to the database. Or even just call into the office and give the info :)

Where are you located? What devices and services are available to you?

I would proabably (need more info to make a more informed choice) recommend looking into using BlackBerries if they're available to you. They're stable, secure, fast and reliable. Does your company already have any devices in use?

We are located in rural Illinois. So cell signal is about our only option to connect (even that is not always available.)

We have no devices, other than cell phones, but will be purchasing what we need to accomplish this.

Not familiar with Blackberry. Why would we want that vs. a smartphone?

Also, we want to be able to update our database 24 hours, therefore calling in would not work.

Ultimately we want to have a web site that our clients can access to determine the status of their jobs based upon information provided from our field reps.

I appreciate your help with this.

[Guest chucky.egg]

A quick and easy way would be to make some simple web pages with drop down boxes, check boxes etc for the values you want the field staff to provide.

Those pages could be stored on your web server (or even locally on your phones to reduce data traffic, although that raises other issues), and would simply send POST commands to the web server which would then perform the updates to the database.

You could develop a client application for the phones, but it's a lot of work and not so easy to adapt if your requirements change.

It's hard to describe in words, but this may make sense:

Phone-based pages:

Field: "Job number" (text, numbers etc)

Field: "On site" (date and time)

Field: "Status" (limited options: "Complete", "Awaiting parts", "Given up")

eg: \Program Files\Update.htm?JobNumber=ABC123&OnSite=05/06/06-12:00&Status=Complete

Web server pages:

'Check your input is valid

'Connect to the database

'Find the record to update

rstUpdate = select * from tblUpdate where JobNumber = request("JobNumber")

'Make the changes

rstUpdate.fields("OnSite")=request("OnSite")

rstUpdate.fields("Status")=request("Status")

Job Done!

[Guest chucky.egg]

Check here for some simple ASP samples

http://www.asp101.com/samples/db_update.asp

[Guest nausea]

We are located in rural Illinois. So cell signal is about our only option to connect (even that is not always available.)

We have no devices, other than cell phones, but will be purchasing what we need to accomplish this.

Not familiar with Blackberry. Why would we want that vs. a smartphone?

Also, we want to be able to update our database 24 hours, therefore calling in would not work.

Ultimately we want to have a web site that our clients can access to determine the status of their jobs based upon information provided from our field reps.

I appreciate your help with this.

The Blackberry was developed for businesses and was developed with data connectivity in mind. It is rugged, reliable, secure and stable. Even the US government uses it! Blackberrys provide military grade data encryption and compression services, while Windows Mobile devices dont have any built in. In my opinion, they have the best integration of phone, email, web browser, personal information management, etc. In my experience, Blackberrys tend to be more stable than Windows Mobile devices (both Smartphones and Pocket PCs). Check out: http://www.blackberry.net/products/blackbe...lackberry.shtml

You may also want to keep your existing phones for calls and get new devices for data only. Otherwise while youre using data calls go straight to voicemail. And you also dont want to have one point of failure.

I think it mostly comes down to personal prefernce and whats available to you. Whos your carrier?

Also, if you have existing applications that were created for Windows you could more easily port them to a Windows Mobile device.

With the info you provided, I would guess that creating a website based solution would be ideal, that would also free you from being tied to a particular device. You would just need a device that has a web browser.

You can PM me more detailed information about your business and what youre trying to accomplish and I can give more specific help (if you dont want to post specific info on a public forum). For example:

Who is your wireless carrier? (to know what devices/services are available to you)

What kind of information are going to be updating? How do you envision the new solution will work? (to figure out if a website will suffice)

Do you already have a server? Is it running Windows or Linux/Unix? (to know what existing tech you have to work with)

Do you have existing applications written for windows that you would want to run on a mobile device?

Will your field reps benenfit from email access too?

Do you have a preference in device?

Would you want them to carry two devices, one for phone and one for data?

[Guest Tech]

easily done usin some customized software:

.NET

.NET webservice

SQL Server

you could also make a public internal site which users access, itll then put the data in SQL

or make a client software which will call webservices which will insert into SQL