File maintenance

June 23, 200520 yr

I am running 2 filemaker files on a filemaker advanced 7.03 server running on a WIN 2003 server. One has 37 tables and holds the majority of all of the data. The second file has 10 tables and is used as a dumping ground for a data exchange between a MySQL database and the main Filemaker database. The main database is also quite large. The largest table has 700,000 records and is still growing at a good rate.

At times I have had some serious issues with script running and never stopping or just running far longer than normal. Three weeks ago I did a recovery and then created a compact copy of those recovered files and everything seemed to be a lot better.

I have since read that exporting the data, creating a clone and then importing the data into the clone may be a better and safer solution. Can anyone comment on this? I would like to know what the best practice is for keeping this database running in good shape and how often I should do so.

If exporting is the way do I have to do an export from each table then import back into each table. I can't seem to find any easier way.

June 28, 200520 yr

Recovery is not a file maintenance mechanism. It is meant to recover a crashed file to a state where you can get the data out and import the data into a known good backup. To do that it will sacrifice anything that it feels might be corrupt (data, field definitions, layouts, scripts,...).

Compacting a file is usually all the file maintenance you will need. Best way to do that is to take the file down from the server.

Importing into a clone would work too but it is a lot more work and potentially dangerous if you forget to reset the serial numbers or accidentally toggle the "perform auto enter" on import.

June 28, 200520 yr

Author

Thank you for the reply. I am not sure why but my database is not as heathy as others I have worked with. It tends to not want to run scripts after it has run for a while without some form of maintenance.