Whats better? FM Server 8 for Mac or Windows

January 19, 200619 yr

Newbies

I work for a company and we have been traditionally using Mac hardware to host our FileMaker servers. We have hosted FileMaker 6 & 7 on various G4s & G5s. However we are now looking at purchasing FileMaker 8 .

In order to cut costs we can purchase a pretty good dell poweredge for $1500 instead of an expensive Xserve. Would you say that FileMaker Server is better suited for Windows or Mac. This box will be mostly used on the internet by our clients so it will be exposed to the internet.

Please only reply with good experiences, not the typical "Windows sucks" or "Mac rules" responses, I am going to use the arguments here to either agree with the decision to buy Windows or oppose (as it stands I oppose).

Thanks guys!

Edited January 19, 200619 yr by Guest

January 20, 200619 yr

FMS is just a tiny app (service/daemon really). How well it performs depends largely on your solution and the network layout, not on FMS itself.

The level of experience with either Windows Server management or OSX Server management is also a big factor in how people judge. They are two different skill sets. Usually sticking with what you know will produce the best results.

FMS on Windows is rock solid.

January 20, 200619 yr

Just wanted to say FMS works great on Macintosh hardware as well. Even though the Xserves are more expensive, they are WELL worth it with the numerous hardware and software management tools OS X Server offers.

Additionally, we have just found that a bug that exists in FMSA8's XML interface when used with FX.php is NOT existent in the OS X version of such. Not that that's a huge argument, but worth mentioning.

- John

January 21, 200619 yr

To clarify: the bug has nothing to do with fx.php. It's FMS returning a malformed XML document under certain circumstances:

- when using one of the two available XML grammars

- and if there is a related field on the layout but no related data exists.

While it definitely is a bug and needs to be fixed, it seems to me that fx.php should easily be rev'd to allow for the other XML grammar. I don't use PHP myself (I use C#/.NET) and when the bug hit, I simply switched to the other XML grammar.