I am working on a database for a nonprofit org and they just bought FMP Server 5.5 and 25 licenses. The current version in use is 3.0 on PII & PIII machines running W2K.

1) Anything I should watch out for in the conversion? (Saw the one about the file name changes for scripts, etc.)

2) As I understand it, it is better to set up a dedicated machine to use as the server rather than use their network server.

3) What is the issue/s about the difficulty in administration and maintenance using windows machines? (Saw the post about the ease of using MAC's for this.)

Also, on a separate issue, I have had two very frustrating incidents in the last couple of months with damaged files due to crashes from electrical problems. (Yes, they have UPS) Once, when construction work in the building did something that fried the router and again this week when the building had a fire drill and building management must have done something with the power while we were out of the building. (Guess we need to take time to shut down the server in emergencies.)

The problem was the same in both cases. When spellchecking the record it will crash the database at the Done button or sometimes on Skip. The odd thing is that it seems to happen on one layout but not on another (and moving the script button from one layout to the other didn't fix it so it is not in the script). After being able to reopen the file a time or two it becomes damaged but recoverable but still has the same problem. I'm thinking that it may be that Filemaker itself needs to be removed and reinstalled at this point. (I think that might have fixed it the last time.) Any comments or suggestions?

Thanks for your support. I just realized that I am way undercharging for my work (because I work for cash strapped nonprofit clients) and thinking of quitting because I'm tired of losing my shirt. Maybe I should reconsider and find deeper pocket clients and charge more...

Thanks again for any help.

RE:

1) Anything I should watch out for in the conversion? (Saw the one about the file name changes for scripts, etc.)

AFAIK the only problem is with long passwords. I believe up to 10 characters it is OK.

RE:

2) As I understand it, it is better to set up a dedicated machine to use as the server rather than use their network server.

Yes. On the other hand -- modern machines are probably OK. Just try. We did run: FM server, LanFax, Proxy, Email, filesharing and domain controller on 2x200MHz with 15 users with heavy load and it was OK.

RE:

3) What is the issue/s about the difficulty in administration and maintenance using windows machines? (Saw the post about the ease of using MAC's for this.)

Difficulty in administration?::?:?:??

What administration?

The only problem in past was compatibility of MS console with IE above v. 5. Just put IE 5 on the serving machine and you should be OK.

In fact, MacX users had plenty of problems with backups -- see the forum. Since we switched FM and other work from Mac to Windows we have much less problems. It requires someone who knows what to do with Windows, but these days it is plain sailing.

Obviously -- best is to stick with platform you know. No surprises.

Filenames :

Under FMS 3, if you wanted a file to be hidden from "hosts" then a trailing underscore ("_") needed to be added to the filename.

In FMS 5, this will hide the file from web deployed systems.

To hide files in "hosts" under FMP 5 there is a specific preference setting. You need to go through each file using FMP 5 to make the setting.