When building an IT environment for a large casino and hotel that weaves together traditional mainframe applications with forward-looking Web-based software, rolling the dice on critical database decisions isn't a wise gamble.

Despite the dependence of many casino-oriented applications on IBM infrastructure and "green screen" technology, casinos such as the Borgata Hotel Casino & Spa are embracing Microsoft Corp.'s .Net development tools and SQL Server DBMS to bridge the gap between disparate platforms and to enrich the customer experience.

On the eve of its first anniversary next month, the Borgata, of West Atlantic City, N.J., is reaping the rewards of its bet on SQL Server 2000, according to John Forrelli, director of administrative systems. The Borgata is using the DBMS to power its back-end systems and integrate them with popular hospitality industry applications that are tethered to IBM's DB2 database running on iSeries servers.

Forrelli said he is particularly excited about SQL Server's integrated business intelligence features.

"That's the home run. The developers that work in my group, if they develop a Web page for a customer kiosk, they can use [Visual Basic .Net], whereas if we had another BI tool, they'd have to learn all of their applications," Forrelli said. "From a [total cost of ownership] point of view, you are saving money on the application side, and you don't have to staff up and throw all this money at training. [The database] absolutely has to be integrated and tie in all these pieces."

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