Editable forms on the web

I'm in the middle of a ferocious debate about a web application that I've
built the user interface for.  The application does nothing more than data
management:  retrieve, capture, display and update of records in database
tables.

My solution is a four-step process for each piece of data captured:

1. Display the recordset.
2. Add a record.
3. View a detail of a row.
4. Edit a record.

The back-end developers, who are all coming from a client-server point of
view, think that this process is too time consuming.  Instead, they want one
page that displays the record in editable fields.  They also want the user
to be able to query mulitple records, and then have the records be displayed
on a page, again in editable fields.

I keep telling them that this is not the way the web works, but they're not
listening.  I keep telling them that this is the web, not client server.  I
keep telling them that my solution is 508 and WCAG compliant, but they don't
care.

All they care about is that transactions to the server are going to slow the
system down.  I told them that if that's the case, then we shouldn't be in
this business.

So I'd like some opinions from folks here, because we're going to have a
meeting on this on Monday, and I want some ideas.  If you'd like, you can
even preview the four-step process here:
http://www.r2communications.com/testSite/reports.html

Thanks in advance.

Randal Rust

Received on Wednesday, 3 July 2002 08:36:40 UTC