Path Resolution From Server

[bdam]

The consensus in the container forum is that if a container is filled by reference or via a calculation the file (and resulting path) must be

in a directory that is shared and mapped/mounted on every client machine.

What this says to me is that the client is responsible for fetching and displaying the file; not the server. That explains why you need it mapped/mounted locally and why we need to concern ourselves with the client's OS when calculating the path.

If the above is all true then I would want/wish that the server could resolve, fetch, and display containers (paths) filled by reference or via scripts.

This would solve the issue where those who cannot afford a image/file server need to open up filesharing on their FM server (which is bad) because the server would have direct acess to the files. One would have to actually log onto the machine to add/remove/edit files but that could easily be scripted. This wouldn't prevent the user from having a separate server because they can just tell the FM server to mount, fetch, and display the file from their file server.

It would also eliminate having different paths for different client OSes. If your server is the one responsible for resolving the path then the local OS is taken out of the equation.

It would also resolve the concern of having to map/mount the image server on every local client. In a large organization with hundreds of machines with non-tech users this can be a chore.

I know that this can be acheived by not referencing/scripting the container but I use the same images (authors, covers, employees) in several different places and need to use a singular copy.

Thoughts?

Bryan

[Genx]

I concur, its a real pain but i've grown used to it with my work arounds, though the issue still arises that users would have to be able to put the images on the server which would still require them to have a mapped drive or access privileges to create over the network. Which brings you back to the very begining...

~Genx

[bdam]

... users would have to be able to put the images on the server ...

Quite true. But at least in this case you can limit who has access to that folder rather than have to make it avaialable to everyone.

Alternatively what I would do is have a scheduled script run on the FM server that would simply pull images from a source directory somewhere. If you want to add an employee, book cover, or author image simply put it in directory X and tomorrow it will be there. There is only one mapped/mounted drive to maintain (FM server to File Server) and your FM server itself isn't being shared.

Bryan

[Genx]

Fair enough, at least it would be a lot more useful in a wan scenario...

~Genx