Updating Membership & Contributions on Second Computer

[R.V.Fagan]

We currently have all data (funds,membership, contributions) all on one computer. Is there any risk to continue doing daily fund accounting on original computer, and restore a backup of membership & contributions to a second computer to update these fies. When completed we would backup those files on computer two, and then restore them on original computer.

[NeilZ]

We currently have all data (funds,membership, contributions) all on one computer. Is there any risk to continue doing daily fund accounting on original computer, and restore a backup of membership & contributions to a second computer to update these fies. When completed we would backup those files on computer two, and then restore them on original computer.

I take it you cannot network these computers, right ??

I'm going to label these computers: Accounting and Membership.

First off, I would make VERY sure that no contributions or membership data can be updated on the Accounting computer, and also that no accounting is updated on the Membership computer.

In this way, you're sure that nothing will be overwritten during these backups. I would do a FULL backup on the Accounting computer in order to get all the data on the Membership computer. This would include the Funds Accounting, as the Chart of Accounts is needed if you should need to create a new CONTRIBUTION FUND.

Then I would only backup the Membership and Contributions data from the MEMBERSHIP computer to restore to the Accounting machine. I would NOT move anything the other way (from the Accounting machine to the Membership machine) after the initial database restore.

That said, if these machines are in the same office, I would just network them, and use the Permissions system to keep users in their own areas of responsibility.

[R.V.Fagan]

Thanks Neil. I just wanted to take a laptop offsite to have some membership data only updated (email, dob, tel, cell, etc). I just wanted to make sure invoices and cheques could carry on un impeded. Then just restore the enlarged membership file onto the accounting pc.