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 "fat " 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.
The following diagram depicts how applications can be distributed anywhere you want with AcuConnect.
Like any paradigm, there are advantages and disadvantages to the thin and fat 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 -- ease of use vs. system integrity
Performance -- speed of client vs. speed of server
Physical location of program and data files -- two-tier vs. three-tier applications
Number of users -- availability vs. contention
Network bandwidth -- intranet vs. Internet, dial-up vs. direct access
User requirements -- occasional use vs. constant connection, batch processing vs. real-time
processing