FM Server instability on OS X

[lazp]

We have been having instability problems with FM Server 5.5v3 on Mac OS X 10.2. We switched from Mac OS 9 to Mac OS X about four weeks ago and we were not having these problems until recently.

Symptoms

[Anatoli]

That is known problem described at FM web pages.

[lazp]

Do you refer to Article 108428 ?

Because we are not attempting to close any file, and the corruption still occurs...

[Anatoli]

I do not know.

We switched to from Macs to Windows years ago and never regret it.

[ernst]

Hi Lazp,

Every night OS X does some 'housekeeping' tasks called 'crontabs'

I can imagine these tasks interfering with either Filemaker itselve or with your raid setup.

My first guess would be to serve the files from another (non striped) drive, preferably not connected to the Sonnet card. Second would be to do update to 10.2.6

F.Y.I. we run FM Server on an eMac, and as long as it's left alone it runs without any trouble for months.

Let me know what happens!

Ernst.

[dkemme]

I would agree with taking the files off the RAID drive. Server on OSX does not support backups from or to RAID drives for large database files and could be your problem.

[lazp]

Thanks everyone for your answers.

We tried to update to 10.2.6 but it didn't solve the problems. We got back to Mac OS 9 and it works fine for now. We'll do some tests later whitout the RAID, as suggested.

With a little luck, a new updated version of FM Server will be released soon, adressing the instability problems on OS X.

lazp

[Anatoli]

RE: With a little luck, a new updated version of FM Server will be released soon, adressing the instability problems on OS X.

I wouldn't put my money on that. On FM 7 yes. In another words -- maybe after the 7 is out and if it works OK, only after that FM will try to do something with OSX FM server. I see the chance less than 1%.

[dkemme]

I don't think they would release FMP 7 without a version of FMS to serve it. It would severely hurt FMP sales if it couldn't be served.

[Anatoli]

RE: I don't think they would release FMP 7 without a version of FMS to serve it.

I didn't say that.

But FM 7 and FMS 7 will be completely new stuff -- everyone seems to agree with that.

So if FMS 7 is OSX ready and robust, current users of FM 5-6 are still out of luck.

[dkemme]

I agree, I am a bit nervous about what a complete rewrite means. Will conversion be difficult? Will learning how to program in FM 7 be difficult? For those of us that have jobs other than programming but are charged with database management as well, a steep learning curve could be painful. But as the advertising on FM webpage still has business cards with database guru handwritten on them, I hope that the conversion will be painless.

[LiveOak]

If you server machine support booting/installing OS 9, I see absolutely no reason to run FM Server under OS X. There is neither a speed nor stability advantage.

Our preferred OS 9 configuration is to use a RAM Disk. Use Clarkwood Software's RamBunctious and also Peek-a-Boo. Peek-a-Boo allows you to avoid the performance hit when the Finder is clicked to the foreground by allowing explicit processor priority assignments by task. Using Rambunctious (with adequate RAM AND a UPS), gives a 2+ speed improvement and improves stability (no disk fragmentation). We have over 15 server years experience with this configuration in a facility running 5 Mac Cube FM Servers. It is VERY stable.

-bd

[axishift]

we just downgraded again fm server on os x to os 9. same problem, corruption of data. why will filemaker sell a product and knowing its unstable? dont they have a QA team to do it? or QA team doesnt test it carefully?

[BobWeaver]

Is it possible that some users may be accessing the files via file sharing?