Cheers Roel,
That was exactly what I wanted to hear... Have documented decisions thoroughly...
Just one more thing...
4. Requirement: It must allow the user to search the data for all records, or for records where the name and/or location fields exactly match values specified by the user.
I think I'm confusing myself the more I think this over.
Does ....
"or for records where the name and/or location fields exactly match values specified by the user" ....
mean: for a search result to be returned the search criteria must exactly match the record field? i.e: In order to return the Hotel California record, the user must search for 'Hotel California'.
or does it mean: for a search result to be returned the record criteria can partially contain the search criteria? ie: Hotel California record is return from search criteria 'Hotel', or 'California', or 'otel', or 'a'... etc.
I have implemented the second interpretation but I'm now aligning myself with the first one? In which case why do they state in the beginning of the project brief...
'The following are the "top level" features that must be implemented:
A client program with a graphical user interface that connects to the database
A data access system that provides record locking and a flexible search mechanism
Network server functionality for the database system'
... when a search mechanism based on the first interpretation is not really that flexible