Fujitsu Legacy Modernisation offering for Conversion of Microsoft Access™ to Microsoft SQL Server™
Fujitsu working with our Legacy Modernisation partner ConvertU2 Technologies delivers a highly efficient service to migrate your Microsoft Access databases quickly, reliably and with minimal risk, to Microsoft SQL Server 2005/2008.
The Challenges of Migrating
Organisations often have a significant number of Microsoft Access databases that have grown organically throughout an enterprise, many of which have become mission critical. It is important that such databases are protected from data loss, corruption, poor performance and unauthorised access. IT Departments understand the importance of hosting these applications centrally on a robust server platform such as SQL Server. Up until now there has not been a robust or low risk way of transitioning from Access to SQL Server. By moving to SQL Server your enterprise can start to leverage the substantial advantages of a central Enterprise Database.
- The SQL Database is more reliable as it is maintained by your IT department, not sitting on a personal computer in an open office environment.
- SQL is Scalable and is designed for multiple concurrent users.
- Removes the limitations of ad hoc security with a SQL enterprise level secure database.
- Database optimisation allows for greater performance.
- SQL Server’s rich functionality allows more efficient Management and Maintenance operations above what can be achieved using Access.
- SQL Server is suitable for data audit and data compliance regulations, Access is not.
- Integrate your Access application data with other enterprise applications.
Microsoft Access solutions cannot reliably support more than a few concurrent users and tend to place significant burden on network infrastructures.
The evolution of these databases into business critical applications means additional investment is required to migrate them to Microsoft SQL Server.
What Options Do You Have?
There are 3 options for Microsoft Access databases identified as candidates for upgrade:-
- Do nothing - A business decision may be taken to accept the risks.
- Rewrite - Re-architect and rewrite the application, often requiring extensive investment and effort.
- TransMigrate - Cost effectively converts the Access database to Microsoft SQL Server to gain significant business process benefits whilst keeping your existing Access application unchanged”.
How Does This Fit With Microsoft’s Tool Suite?
The upgrade path and conversion tools available from Microsoft partially complete the conversion from Microsoft Access to Microsoft SQL Server.
Estimates vary depending on the complexity of the database but the optimum degree of success for automated conversion a project using the Microsoft tools falls in the range of 5% to 40%. By comparison, the Fujitsu Legacy Modernisation service utilising the 2SQL migration toolkit achieves 80% to 90% automated conversion rate for a project leaving substantial cost and time savings and significantly less manual effort.
What is Fujitsu’s Solution to the Issue?
The Fujitsu Legacy Modernisation team combined with ConvertU2 Technologies utilise the 2SQL migration toolkit, achieving automated conversion levels of between 80% and 90%. The remaining conversion work is completed by the team to achieve the desired outcome. This service has been proven to shorten migration project timelines by more than 80%, a significant cost savings with on the project cost, whilst reducing the risks.
What is Fujitsu’s Approach?
The first step is an “Application Value Assessment” workshop to learn about your environment, your business processes and desired outcomes. From this workshop, we agree on suitable candidate Microsoft Access application(s) to migrate. Fujitsu then performs an in depth analysis of the database schema, design and complexity using the 2SQL Detective™ tool to determine the conversion difficulty and likely issues. From this, we present accurate estimates of the cost, timeframe and resource requirements for undertaking the entire migration project form start to finish. Fujitsu does not require data for this task, thus avoiding issues related to sensitive data
Secondly, the 2SQL Genie™ is used to automate the migration process to its farthest point. The remaining small percentage of conversion is completed by the Legacy Modernisation team.
To reduce risk, no functional changes are made during the migration. This also facilitates industrialised testing on the migrated application to ensure that the old and new applications function identically.
What are the Outcomes?
- Removal of multiple version management and maintenance nightmare.
- Enhanced Security; the SQL Server is a secure enterprise level database.
- Network Bandwidth Improvements and efficiency.
- Improved sharing abilities, SQL Server can handle 1000’s of users.
- Database Scalability with no restrictions.
- Backup abilities; SQL has robust mechanisms to do perform backups while users are engaged.
- SQL Server gives you cost effective centralised IT control.
- The migration path between Microsoft Access and SQL Server is easier with the Fujitsu Legacy Modernisation Service.
- Microsoft Access databases converted to Microsoft SQL Server using the 2SQL toolkit are configured enhanced performance and maximum server-side processing and minimal on the client-side, an important capability when converting complex databases.
- The migration is transparent to end users, the Microsoft Access front end user interface remains unchanged but data processing occurs on the server.
- Improved data access from your existing reporting and Business Intelligence tools.
- Improved data integration with other enterprise applications.
Our Capabilities
Fujitsu's Legacy Modernisation service for Microsoft Access to Microsoft SQL Server is based on the 2SQL toolset, created by our Australian partner, ConvertU2 Technologies. The delivery team is entirely based in Australia/New Zealand and supported by ConvertU2 Technologies. The Fujitsu resources that undertake this work are part of our .Net competency group and project management practice. They are based in each of our Australian regions and New Zealand. The team are able to undertake the Legacy Modernisation either on specific client sites or in our offices depending on the needs of the client.
Examples of where the ConvertU2 toolset has been used in the past are available on request.
Ask Yourself the Critical Questions
- Do you have mission critical applications built using Microsoft Access?
- Are you concerned about the scalability and performance of Microsoft Access in a networked environment?
- Do you have large Microsoft Access databases or many concurrent users?
- Do you want to centralise your business data to facilitate disaster recovery and business continuity?
- Is Microsoft Access restricting your technical options?
- Is your organisation highly risk averse yet needing to move on?
If you answer "Yes" to any of the above questions, please contact Fujitsu for a more in-depth discussion of our Legacy Modernisation options for Microsoft Access to Microsoft SQL Server.
Legacy Modernisation Alliance Partners
To find out more about our alliance partner ConvertU2 click on the above logos
Please contact your Fujitsu client executive directly, email Legacy.Modernisation@au.Fujitsu.com or download the questionnaire and send it to the above email address for an estimated timeframe and costing.
Access and SQL Server are Microsoft trademarks 2SQL detective and 2SQL Genie are ConvertU2 trademarks.
