Distribution Considerations

AcuConnect allows you to distribute your application components to best use your enterprise resources. You can perform most of your processing on the client (in a "thick" client arrangement), most on the server (in a "thin" client arrangement), or divide the processing equally. The ability to choose between these options or select anything in between makes the AcuConnect client a "smart" client.

Like any paradigm, there are advantages and disadvantages to the thin and thick client approaches. Deciding where to distribute your processing tasks requires extensive knowledge of the network. Your decision should be based on several issues, including:

• Security — weighing ease of use against system integrity.
• Performance — scaling client speed versus the speed of the server.
• Physical location of program and data files, factoring in two-tier versus three-tier applications.
• Number of users — planning for availability versus contention.
• Network bandwidth — intranet versus Internet, dial-up versus direct access.
• User requirements — occasional use versus constant connection, and batch processing versus real-time processing.