Craig Wall

I'm still trying to discern which system attributes are elastic with T2. There is this quote, "T2 instances are backed by the latest Intel Xeon processors with clock speeds up to 3.3 GHz during burst periods." So base and burst attributes can vary widely. But I don't yet know what all can scale during burst periods...does available RAM scale? Number of core? Again my client has extremely sporadic, light usage 8 months of the year. With T2 you get "credits" for quiet usage, which is why the pricing is low. t2.large 2 vCPU 8GB RAM

The immediate client is tourism based, where 8 months of the year are pretty quiet with just a few users. So the elastic nature of EC2 appeals quite a bit. And Amazon announced a particular instance type that might be ideal for this sporadic use model (during off-season): Burstable Performance Instances (T2) Do you mind me asking what monthly price point you ended up with after calibrating...and number of users?

I'm exploring using EC2 to host solutions for a client and for myself. Does anyone have any experience with this? My most immediate questions are: -Once configured and logged in remotely...does the environment exactly mirror using a local server? (Windows Server) -For 4-6 users could I likely opt for one of the most modest configurations? -Ancipated cost for 4-6 FM users? I'm watching an in-depth training series on AWS and EC2 at Lynda.com here: http://www.lynda.com/AWS-tutorials/Welcome/163929/187332-4.html I'll post anything worthwhile that I learn. Update: I found this more informative description of what kind of computer drives a particular "instance" https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/

Claus, you write, But as I understand FileMaker Inc is insisting that we all do exactly that. Thank you for the link--and your work in co-creating the video! I'll check it out.

My clients have reported several instances seeing an error almost the same, something suggesting FileMaker be re-installed. I'll try to get more details.

bcooney, James...thank you for your replies. I guess I'm still confused then from what you are saying James. I suppose I'll have to bite the bullet and spend some time better grokking what SSL is all about. But for my immediate needs let me simplify my question even further. Given this context: All Mac clients and Mac server...All 13.09...Does Apple's best practice suggest we worry about installing any SSL certificates on client machines? I'm going to ride with bcooney's answer if I don't hear otherwise.

I find the tech documents surrounding 13.0 v9 to be a little confusing. I am assuming that the SSL certificate only needs to be installed on FMS and no certs are needed for clients accessing the server. I believe this to be correct but want to be sure. Can I get a word on this? Thanks in advance.

I developed a solution that utilizes container fields in about a dozen different places through the solution. In about half dozen instances I used external storage. All was well for six months. Suddenly within the last week the linked container fields all display "missing." All of them. Linked files cannot be viewed, accessed or exported. I was directed by FileMaker Tech to copy the db and linked file folder to where I could work with them offline, shorten the file names/paths and then afterwards restore everything to the server. I did exactly that and believed resolution to the issue was at hand. Working locally on a different computer all the linked files displayed normally and were perfectly accessible. But when I copied everything back to the server: it was as before for all clients. Nothing was resolved. I have absolutely no idea what to do about this and it's a huge deal--not only with the immediate project. The next phase of work with this client was to help them go paperless. If FileMaker cannot reliably store linked documents....Houston, we have a problem. Context: Mac Filemaker Server 13.05.520

Thanks to all with some very helpful replies. I can see my notion was incorrect and that I better learn more about cache settings! Bruce, the server and clients are all using latest FM13.

Assuming we aren't talking about something that occurs in the middle of a script being run...but rather an individual user doing data entry...isn't any data committed on a local client immediately stored on the server?

I've seen the exact same issue, James. Keyboard responsiveness in other programs seems to get badly interrupted. I even started to wonder if my keyboard had a bad USB cable or something, but with time it became obvious that it was only misbehaving while doing large imports and such in the bg. Yes, I'm on Mac. Yes, I'm using Yosemite.

I have designed a solution that is shared over a network that I remotely oversee. My client has witnessed frequent loss of client connection, and I see it myself about once a day when I log in remotely. Losing connection is an issue in itself which I've been researching. But what I'd like your opinion about is a related issue. Several staff members swear that on a few occasions when they lose their connection that they also lost some of their work. I've viewed this a spurious claim because of the nature of FM. Sure, I, conceded, you might lose the work in one field but I haven't seen it as possible to lose more than that. Am I wrong? Is it possible in a network environment to lose data--beyond the active field?

Solved. A guy on FileMaker's forum suggested a 1 second delay after each append. That worked.

I have a script that creates a PDF and then proceeds to append 4 other sections of a report to that PDF. It works great for the most part, but my client is crashing with some records. I can repeat the crashes they are experiencing. But never when I step through it with the Script Debugger! So purely at a hunch level I'm wondering if slowing the script down might resolve the problem. I'm not sure of the best way to do that. Thoughts, anyone? In the spirit of disclosure: the document includes SVG header and footer and some pages have 4 or 5 other graphics.

Good to know! Thanks again.

For the first time ever I'm working with ExecuteSQL and I can sure appreciate how--moving forward--it needs to be at the heart of a lot of my projects. But I'm still having challenges with exact syntax. I am trying to do a simple summary count...no subcategories...just a grand total. I can successfully generate a list, but don't want the list of items--just the count. So how do I transform my working syntax to generate a simple count? I've been dismayed that Google can't help me pull up any examples of this. Here is what works for the list: ExecuteSQL ( " SELECT (SCalendarDate) FROM CCALENDAR WHERE Category ='Scheduled Holiday' AND ComingPast='Coming' "; "," ; "" ) I've had no success trying to adapt this for a list, using COUNT and such. It seems like it ought to be so very easy, but I can't find the exact syntax!

I can add two more presumed bugs to FileMaker running in Yosemite. 1. Animated GIFs don't work as they previously did. They don't play at all. 2. The temporary folder seems to "time out." I have some scripts that temporarily store PDFs. The scripts worked flawlessly in Mavericks. Now...if the work session extends very long...the script throw up an error. Restart and the error disappears. I'm wondering if there is some sort of app nap type feature that is at play here, but turning off App Nap within FileMaker itself doesn't appear to resolve the problem. I will also say that aside fro these two bugs I've found no other perturbations in two weeks of usage.

Mike, That might work in one sense, but I don't think if scrutinized that the security folks would be happy with that solution. I'll try to articulate my plan B here later today or tomorrow...and hope that it works. But I've got another fire to put out first.

I really don't want to recreate 10 PDF forms into filemaker forms. That might take 100 hours. PDF is an accepted standard for paperless and signatures.

When attempting to place a digital signature, this is the dreaded message: Obviously asking the staff to move PDFs in and out of Filemaker is impractical. I do have a plan B, but it involves more work for me and is likely less elegant than Plan A. Does anyone know of a way to sign the document within FileMaker. Would using a web viewer work better?

I am trying to help a non-profit agency go paperless, but have run up against a wall because I can't seem to find a way to "sign" a PDF while staying inside FileMaker. Acrobat seems intent on preventing that from happening, I suppose due to security and/or Adobe's business objectives. I expect others have an interest in my objectives as well. Here was Plan A. 1. I would present the staff a list of required documents that they needed to review/complete and sign. ( I've blurred out client information in the screen grabs. Craig Wall = me) 2. When they clicked to launch a particular document my script would create a copy of the PDF with their employee Id appended to the name. The unique PDF would be stored externally and encrypted. The script would then take the user to a second screen where they could review/complete and sign. It's the signature part that has proved problematic. I'll continue this in post #2

Well guys...SUCCESS! I still have a second place in the solution where I need to add the same functionality...and it will be a bit more involved. But I can see that this works and have it working in one part. temporaryPath is THE BOMB. That is...A bomb that works peacefully and agreeably!

I hadn't known a thing about a temporaryPath. That looks VERY promising. Thanks!!! OK. I'm ready to give this a whirl. Thanks gentleman!

No need/expectation for people to open/utilize PDFs outside of FM. I'd like to continue this dialog tonight or tommorrow ...and I'll hope to contribute some ideas as well as questions. Thanks Wim, Rincher.