How Do We Make Databases So Easy?
The Architect Paradigm:
Proven Relief for Custom Database Anxiety

There are several ways to make yourself more comfortable while you're having a custom database created for your business. You can acquire a comprehensive knowledge of database development, database design, and programming, you can acquire nerves of steel, or you can work with NW Database Services.

How we work: We use an architect "paradigm" – a programming process that gives you basic functionality right from the start. By working in this way we give you the advantage of using and becoming familiar with your database as we do your database design and database development for you.

Why we work this way: No matter how well planned a program (or a building) is, you'll always think of improvements once you start using it. In turn, each improvement may point to additional, necessary features. Using the "architect paradigm" allows you to try out your new database during the database design and database development process and participate in its changes. If you discover an unmet need along the way, our working method allows us to tell you, "Good idea. We'll include it in the next development step."

See what your new database will look like . . .

Your Custom Database Will "Fit Like a Glove"

When you can give feedback along the way and try out the changes as they're made, your database will conform more closely to the way you do business. It's like staying in your house while it's being built. Along the way you help us develop the interface best suited to you and your other users; so by the time it's installed, you're already familiar with the way it works.

Unless you go to school to learn computer programming, you'll have a hard time judging just how good your database really is. But we've found that clients can tell if the interface is efficient and comfortable, and if the database is doing what they envisioned it would do. Because we work closely with you right from the start, you get a better feel for how close the database is to what you really need.

Contact us for more Database Design information

How Do You Know You're Getting Your Money's Worth?

Most database clients working under a conventional agreement comfort themselves by saying, "the programmer seems to know what he's doing." But they don't really know because they have nothing to go on but a proposal full of technical jargon and hypothetical milestones. With NW Database, our milestones are not based on estimates but on real issues as they come up. Step-by-step, you will know to know where you're at all the time.

Your CPA Will Sleep Better Too!

Working with our system can also you save you a lot of money. Under the usual arrangement, you hire a programmer who goes away for a month and comes back with a completed program and a five-figure invoice. We work with you incrementally, so that, after a preliminary deposit, our time is typically billed in 20 hour blocks, with the understanding that your feedback is required at each stage. This guarantees that your database design and development will result in true custom fit, and protects your budget from having to pay for functionality you've never tried out; and may not have actually needed.

It's Good for You Too

There is no doubt that our clients prefer to use our database development "architect paradigm". One benefit to working this way is that you get what you want because you help design what you want. Other benefits may not be as obvious. As you "live in your house" you suddenly see things that weren't clear from the blueprints. You can, in effect, "move walls, re-plumbing, and put in extra windows", while it's still coming together. We give you the chance to correct things before it's too late.

Cut the Learning Curve

Conceptually, databases are simple things; computer programs that store the data your business needs stored, and then output it in the form of organized information that your business can use. But it's here that things often get dicey, because in order for this to happen, the one who understands the business must be an experienced programmer, or the experienced programmer must understand your business. (And, when you stop to think about it, how long did it take you to learn your own business?)

A database development programmer will have to learn your business well enough to insure that the result works in the real world of your business environment - day to day, hour to hour, and situation by situation. The only way to minimize the time this takes (and cost it usually incurs) is the database design Architect method, where your ongoing review of the "plans" and regular visits to the "building site" during construction mean that any deviations from your vision can be brought back into focus before they have gone too far in a wrong direction.

Building for The Future

Once your database is installed and working, you have a powerful tool for analyzing business information. After a time, you're going to learn what it means to your company. It may remain an information collection tool or it could be used reveal significant opportunities or weaknesses in how you do business. It's like finally getting the strong pair of glasses you've needed. Who knows what you'll eventually be able to see? We've had many clients who have finally gotten a clear picture of who their customers really are and what their interaction patterns look like.

Contact us for more Database Development and Database Design information