Hello All,
I am looking for opinions and suggestions on setting up integration between
a back-end PostgreSQL database engine hosted on a web server and a client
using Excel spreadsheets to store and print internal product information and
pricing.
Here's the scenario: I am using a Linux web server, Apache, PostgreSQL,
PHP3.
The client's secretaries input all product information currently into Excel
spreadsheets, at there office location on there workstations, dial-up
Internet connection, they will not at the current time switch to complete
web integration. Each month they update product pricing and new products
additions into the excel spreadsheet. On the client's web site we have a
back-end database with the same product and pricing information. The
problem, I need to develop a way for the client to upload an exported excel
spreadsheet in tab-deliminated format to the server and rebuild or update
the PostgreSQl database on the web to reflect the changes.
My first thought on the situation would be to write the proper scripts to
allow the client to upload the file to the web server, then click on a
button via a web browser that would run a compiled PHP command to grad the
uploaded file, put it into a variable and run the command psql pg_dump and
rebuild the database with the updated information. This seems inefficient
however, along with the problem of the server running as 'nobody' and I am
wondering if a more efficient ways exists and if you all would have any
suggestions?
Thank you everyone,
Blake S.