OO or procedural

Question

I have an Access db I use for my checkbook (with a good amount of fairly simple VBA behind it) and I'd like to rewrite it as a stand-alone program with a SQL backend. I'm thinking of using either C++, Java, or Python.

I had assumed, before I started, that I would write it OO because I thought that I would think "in OO terms" (due to a OO Logic class and a C++ class I took), but I'm finding that I can only visualize it as procedural (but maybe because I'm mentally stuck in thinking of how the db works in Access). How do I decide? Am I making sense or does it seem like I'm not understanding the concepts?

Thanks for your help.

Answer 1

Well, OO may well be overkill, but it is excellent practice. Any code monkey can write procedural code. Its the path of least resistance in every case, which is why most people use it for one off apps that don't do much. However, if you're writing to get experience in working with OO, than it is best to think of it that way. You could start by designing an object that manages financial transaction, then you will also need a way to interact with the DB. Perhaps you could write a DB layer where you abstract away the database calls from the transaction object using the Entity framework where you could learn LINQ (or whatever the JAVA equivalent is). This is all assuming that you are doing this for fun and practice.

Answer 2

I'd suggest OO - it's not harder than procedural programming, actually easier to maintain with the right tool. Delphi would be my choice - great DB programming support, visual designer, strongly-typed, plenty of components available. There are many great applications that are written in Delphi. Often underestimated, there are many reasons it's got a loyal following.

Now I'll duck as the Delphi-haters load up with tomatoes.