FMS on top of pure Darwin?

[dayhox]

So FileMaker Server's main daemons, fmserverd and fmserver_helperd, are essentially all that are really needed to run a FMServer machine. So why not run it on top of a pure Darwin, not OSX machine? Anyone see where this would not work? I am just looking at a vanilla FMS which servers a couple of big dbs, nothing fancy, just want to lessen the fluff that an OS X install runs so that compute power is mainly available to FMS and transactions.

[Wim Decorte]

You need the OSX GUI to do most of the settings though, right? Or is there a config file where you can set it all (have no servers on OSX so I can't check).

Also not sure whether the event logging would work properly.

And you would squarely put yourself outside of the support scope. That in itself if probably reason enough not to go there.

[dayhox]

Wim,

The application settings are kept in a .plist (XML file) Within the Library-->FMS-->Library-->ByHost folders (under Mac OS X) I would imagine that all I have to do is get the ownership on it properly, and edit it via vi. I should be good to go.

True about the support, but that's why the forums are here right? Just kidding. This is just more a proof of concept thing, and if I get it working perhaps an added benefit for others?

Anyhow I'll give it a try and see what I see.

Thanks,

d

[Steven H. Blackwell]

[color:red]Do not do this on real copies of your databases. There is no telling what could happen

Steven

[Martin Brändle]

This brings nothing. Most of the system processes use up less than 0.1% of the CPU time per process if you are not actively logged in and using the Mac OS X GUI. Just type "top" in the Unix shell and you see what happens.

With your try, you would maybe get a 2-5% increase in performance: Therefore, rather invest in better hardware (enough RAM, fast CPU, fast hard disks) than your precious work time. And of course, FMS 8, which is claimed to be 40% faster than FMS7: http://www.filemaker.com/products/fms/benchmark.html

Edited December 14, 2005 by Guest

[Martin Brändle]

The .plist file is compressed, and probably you would need the Property List Editor, which has an OS X GUI.

[dayhox]

The plist file IS an XML file. As far as hardware goes, I have an Xserve 2.0DP with 4 gigs of RAM. Because it is an XServe, I cannot install the Tiger Client on it, so it has to be Tiger Server. I thought that instead of widdling my way through the Tiger server autostart scripts and applications that run at boot, I could start with a Darwin install on the Xserve. While this does not do anything for you, I sure hope it does for me.

d