Shared database desktop/web app

We have 2 applications: web-based (PHP) and Desktop (VB) sharing the same database (Hostgator). Our web app has a fast access to the database (it's localhost). Our desktop application suffers with slow access and frequent timeouts. What's the best approach to this kind of issue? S开发者_高级运维hould we share a database? Are there any other solution. Thanks

Some possible solutions:

• Get a faster DB server
• Move your database to a server that is closer to the desktop(s)
• Host your webserver/DB at the location of the desktop(s)
• Have two DBs, the current one that is local to the webserver and a second one that is local to the desktop(s) and set the second up as a slave to the first. You would have to consider if the desktop(s) write to the DB in this scenario. This option is probably not a good one unless the desktop(s) are read-only and aren't worried about possibly out-of-date data. This could potentially work if the desktop(s) read a lot but write less frequently.

There is no problem to "share" a DB. Have you checked the server load and the connection stability?

AFAIK, I dont suppose, this could be a problem. Because, web or desktop, both access the database with MySQL server, so it mustn't be giving mixed performance results.

The problem is probably not that it's shared; rather, it's probably the network that the data is going over. There are very few circumstances in which it's faster to use a network connection than localhost for accessing MySQL data, so you can't expect the same performance from both.

However, you should be able to get a fairly fast and reliable db connection over a good network. If you're moving huge amounts of data, you may have to employ some sort of caching. But if the issues are happening even on moderately-sized queries, you may have to bring that issue to your hosting company for troubleshooting. Many shared hosts are not optimized for remote DB hosting (most sites don't need/use/want it), so if they can't accomodate it, you may have to move to a host that will meet your needs.