>Hi,
> I am developing a multi-user POS system using VFP database. Our design is to place the database in a hign end PC, all of the workstations will shared the table located in server.
> It need to update 4 tables for each transaction. Again, the are about 5-10 users will access to the server at this moment. However, will be grow very soon.
> Which is the better way to update the sales transaction, online or batch processing?
>
>Online : Connect to server database and TABLEUPDATE() immediately once the sales done.
>Batch : Update in local table, and process these local records at the end of the day to update the server datanase.
>

Batch will not reflect changes to any underlying tables until applied, and requires extra logic to back out transactions that are rejected because the underlying data under edit changed during the course of the day. In addition, if run under transactions, you'll accumukate locks for the transactions which can prevent other users from performing operations that might involve similar records. SInce more than one table is involved, you need to use BEGIN TRANACTION/END TRSNACTION/ROLLBACK to ensure that either all related tables update for a given transaction or non do, and there's a nesting limit on accumulated transactions.

Sounds like you should completely rethink your data services layer.