Clay Shannon wrote: > I am commissioned with determining the "right" architecture for an > application for controlling movement of stock in a warehouse. The end-user > needs to be constantly updated as to the materials progress as they feed > the > machines (the "browser" needs to send a message that a piece was inducted, > and then needs to receive a message from the realtime that the piece was > "seen" and then the end-user's display is updated to reflect that (1 item > of > 500 inducted, 2 items of 500 inducted, etc.)
Aren't there already software packages that do that? I think Red Prairie has something like that. Are you writing this for J.C. Penney? JCP is already an RP customer. > Preferably, this/these apps will be written in Delphi32, but if there is a > good reason to do so, Delphi.NET is "on the table." > > Preferably, we will use IntraWeb for Delphi32 for the IntraNet app, but > IntraWeb.NET and ASP.NET are both "on the table." > > Requirements are: > > 1) Use a MS SQL Server database > 2) End-users (Sorter Operators in the Warehouse) must be able to access > the > app via Browser (N PCs/users, where N is between 5 and 50) > 3) Messages (over sockets, presumably) need to be passed back and forth to > a > separate RealTime system either from the IntraNet server app OR from > another > app. The crux here is the Browser display needs to be refreshed constantly > (several times per second), so if the IntraNet app doesn't receive the > messages directly, it needs a fast method to retrieve these messages. Several times per second? Why? What are the consequences if notification that a package has arrived is delayed by a fraction of a second? What are the consequences if it's delayed by even 30 seconds? Is someone really going to be watching the screen that closely? I can only see an issue if the operator is standing there watching the package be delivered, or if the operator is on the phone with the delivery driver who reports that the package is in place. Either way, the operator no longer needs the Web page to report delivery anyway. > If this is to be IntraWeb app, it can update its display by running > database > queries, perhaps with a timer that fires several times per second. How complicated are the queries? Will your database server be able to handle 150 of them per second (figuring 3 queries times 50 operators)? > One idea > I have is to have a second app that communicates with the realtime over > sockets and then writes SQL statements to a database table. The IntraWeb > app > would read this table periodically, grabbing the SQL statements and > running > them. I wonder if this will be fast enough, though... Couldn't the real-time app write to the database itself? -- Rob _______________________________________________ Delphi mailing list -> [email protected] http://www.elists.org/mailman/listinfo/delphi
