Membership App for Multiple Members with Multiple Clients

[neilcovert]

I'm going to be creating a Membership website.  The Members will be Financial Advisors.  Each Financial Advisor who is a Member will have multiple Clients.  Each Financial Advisor who is a Member will be able to enter investment information for each of their clients.

 I'm trying to outline ahead of time the different Tables I will need and whether this will be a one-to-many relationship app or a many-to-many relationship app.

The Caspio Membership App seems to be just a one-to-many template.

Anyone have experience with this or have suggestions as to how to diagram out first on paper?

 

Thanks.

Neil

[TWIRED]

Hi Neil, Im a Caspio newbie too and am at the same stage : testing out caspios advanced capabilities.

My app needs are similar - Many Travel Companies > Many Travel Agents > Many Customers.

The tables can be setup to be many-to-many by clicking on relationships, you can also setup referential integrity there.

For what you want to do , it should be easily possible - but you have to plan your table design and test and learn all the front end/backend  features before hand ,  to see how sprawled your app gets or how lean and efficient it can be made.

 

Heres a video that might help as it addresses more complicated database setups / requirements.

Multi Department with Role Permissions

 

After a few weeks of experimenting and learning caspio,

I think (maybe)  the archilles heel for advanced app builders is:

1)  it doesnt have direct access to T-SQl or stored procedures ,

it does have formula fields - but they are very limited.

2) Views should be able to somewhat solve the above problem - (like a temp fix)  for Updating and working with multiple tables at once, but it then puts the onus on the front end design - which can require many forms and reports. Hence everything has to be built very linear.

3) You most probably will need to get into javascripting to complete a mature solid front end for more advanced stuff.It is reliant on it.

4) There is no single online  manual where you can read and get going on the full specs of the formula field (backend) syntax or the calculated fields (front end). You have to watch many videos and glean your information.

5) The community forum and online help videos etc .. has some outdated info and links to older versions of caspio ,which can be misleading and time consuming sometimes, they need to associate the forum posts with the caspio version number so that people dont chase their tails with incorrect / outdated  info.

6) Getting a clean detailed precise answer to a question can sometimes  be forever or never  

 

7) Lastly the howto videos and information are not updated and maintained properly,

so it can become hours of watching loose videos, with no structured learning . It doesnt provide a governed way to plan the apps.

 

This is just my 2 cents :))

I wish the information  were more concise,detailed and precise on this  forum as well as for the help material. 

That being said , I think Caspio is a wonderful platform to hammer out very simple to slightly complex web apps ,

it has the capability but the support is lacking or can get pricey or can take forever after sifting through mindless hours of videos.

 

A step-by-step Online Manual which is :-

Versioned, Indexed and Planned  (including programming syntax -front end and backend) would help incredibly and also gain caspio a new flock of new customers.

Thanks~

 

 

 

[TWIRED]

ok..

 

It depends on the requirement, ask yourself these questions.

Can a  client possibly , ever  have multiple Financial Advisors ?  >  then you would have a many to many relationship

Does a client  ONLY have one , and only one (Always)  - Financial Advisor ? >   Then it would be a one (Financial Advisor)  to many (Clients)  relationship.

 

 

 

[NealPatil]

Following data is required to be managed as in attached images of spreadsheet prototype.

Financial Advisors

Clients

Investments of Clients

It will provide simple overview of data.

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Security should be implemented :

• Admin should have access to all the data
• Financial Advisors should have access to their client data. Financial advisor will not have access to the data of other financial advisors.
• Client should have access to the data for self and should not have access to any other client

------------------------------------

[neilcovert]

Thanks for your detailed insight.  I watched the "How to Set Up User Permissions" tutorial and it was very helpful. 

I think your Travel Company model might have one more level than I will have in my Financial Advisor model - and so I'm still struggling with whether I have a one-to-many relationship or a many-to-many relationship.

It sounds like instead of having the Many Travel Companies > Many Travel Agents > Many Customers you have -

I have Many Financial Advisors > Many Clients.  I'm not sure I have that 3rd level - although I suppose I could structure the model that way if, for example, a particular financial planning practice or firm had more than one financial advisor.

 

Neil

[neilcovert]

Thanks NealPatil.

That's exactly what I will have.  My Users will be the Financial Advisors.  They will in turn have multiple clients with multiple investments.

So I guess what I'm struggling with as a Newbie is if what I'm contemplating will be a one to many relationship (FA to many clients of the FA).

 

Neil

[NealPatil]

+1 for TexterVaid for explanation of 1ToMany or ManyToMany relationship between advisors and clients.

 

I will describe both 1ToMany and ManyToMany with explanation of data you are managing.

 

My Earlier answer and spreadsheet prototypes were using 1ToMany relationship.  One Advisor has many clients but a client can only have one advisor. 1ToMany relationship is simpler compared to ManyToMany relationship.

 

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ManyToMany relationship is more complex but it gives you all options so you do not need to change your application at later stage if your requirements change. One Advisor has many clients and one Client can have many advisors.

I have created spreadsheet prototypes for the ManyToMany relationship as attachments.

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My recommendation is that you use ManyToMany relationship, as it automatically covers 1ToMany relationship and it gives you advantage of allowing possibility of having more than one advisor for each client.

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Edited December 5, 2016 by NealPatil
Added investors-clients many to many relationship image, removed duplicate attachment