I went to a client to make a minor modification and discovered that the main file is in poor health. Symptom: I deleted a field definition and it crashed FileMaker. Yep, live served.

I went offline, made a copy, compressed the file, and still crashed. Compressed Clone crashed.

Experiment: I tried a recover on a copy and it brought back 5 field defs from years ago (when another programmer created this file).

Previous nights backup copy also has the symptom, so it's been this way for sometime.

I thinking I should go back through backups, find a file that does not exhibit the symptom, add back new fields, relations, scripts, and import the text data from the grumpy file.

Meanwhile I left it live, as there is no other choice, and was functioning despite whatever is causing said symptom.

I AM supposed to rebuild this on 8 very soon, but I don't want to rush that.

This is FM5 Windows served, Using FM6Dev on OSX4.

Opine away!

Don't you have an original "virgin" file as these guys love to call it, Or do you simply modify the file live all the time?? If you don't, i suggest you export all data and restore it to an original copy.

~Genx

A few comments:

1. if the file still runs as is, consider yourself lucky

2. converting straight to FM8 might actually help

3. see my post here for more info: http://masdevelopment.com:3455/1/57?view=print

greg

Interesting...

Apparently she's an old whore - I went back two years in backups, to the file prior to my hire, and same problem.

I had never tried to delete old fields I guess, mainly because I wanted to maintain the old reporting methods in case they were needed.

Yet another reason I kick myself for not insisting on a rebuild rather than work on someone's old files.

Now, considering they've been using that file (I do compress it occasionally) for several years WITH the undiscovered defect...

Ha ha! Whether via ESP or good Googling, I had read your link hours BEFORE your reply!

I really wanted to delay this client's migration a few months. And I REALLY want to build from scratch, not migrate this ugly old thing.

Edited April 18, 200619 yr by Guest

It is a good idea [color:red]Not to delete existing fields, even if you feel they are not needed. I usually just leave them be, or rename them to make them stand out incase I run into a broken relationship, script, or report.

Sounds like you are going to have to recreate your file from scratch. Any reason why not to upgrade to v8 at this time?

Lee

I seriously lack the time, and I've yet to create anything as complex in 8 as I have done in 6. I was hoping to have more time getting comfortable with 8 in the smaller client databases before tackling monsters.

Why is there no icon of a chicken?

Bok bok bok! bok bok!

Edited April 18, 200619 yr by Guest