User upload and enable database process

[DanielD]

Hi,

I want to allow my users the ability to upload and activate their own databases (also to close and remove), but without giving them the full admin console. Is there a way to do this?

I can share out a folder for them to upload the DB's to, but i then need to open the DB's myself. Only via the admin console do they seem to auto Open.

Thanks.

[mr_vodka]

Personally I would recommend against this practice.

[DanielD]

Please tell me why you recommend against this.

I feel that this operation is really user administration, and should be a seperate process from the actual config of the server. A technical administrator is not going to want to be required daily to upload databases.

thanks

[Steven H. Blackwell]

I agree with Mr. Vodka here. Users do not need to be tinkering with the server for technical, security, and business rule process reasons.

Steven

[DanielD]

I agree to this point also - which is why i am asking the question ...I do not want a user to access any technical elements of the server - i just want them to have the ability to make a database that they have created available to others.

Are you saying that a user who creates potentially hundreds of DB's a year, should then ask an admin to upload and make available?

In my mind, Filemaker should have also developed a user upload tool, for splitting out this process.

[Colin Keefe]

Here's one reason:

If users are uploading 100's of databases a year, they'll hit the file limit of the server.

Here's another:

When one of those 100's of databases is corrupted, or requires restoring from a backup, it'll be news to you that the database even exists. And surprises are the last thing a DB administrator wants.

Here's another:

Some user decides it's a great idea to embed 5,000 50MB files in a solution and uploads it to the server, as some sort of document management tool. Everybody in his/her department starts importing and exporting files to that database, completely hosing network bandwidth. The backups take forever to run. And then one of the embedded files corrupts the database.

Meanwhile, you don't even know this file exists.

I can think of other reasons, but basically, you want control over what happens on your FM server.

[DanielD]

All valid points...

whatever i say is not going to change your mind, but in an ideal world i agree with you totally - i should maintain FULL control over this solution. However, in the day to day running of things, you are then expected to be available at a moments notice to make a DB available - which is usually not going to be the case.

Thanks for all your replies.

[Colin Keefe]

I think that being expected to be available "at a moment's notice to make a DB available" is simply not reasonable in the first place, and I'd suggest thinking of ways to change user expectations. I understand you may be in a situation where, as an in-house resource, you feel you don't have the authority to impose restrictions on the end user - particularly if they carry titles that loom large, like VP or CEO or Director of Research.

That said, I think you could certainly apply reasonable rules, such as:

All new databases for the previous week will be opened in batch on Monday at 9AM.

Or some other schedule acceptable to you and the "end user/developer", that manage expectations on both sides. You might find your end users actually appreciate knowing with some reliability exactly when they can expect their updates to happen, and will accept some restrictions in exchange for that assurance of predictability.

[mr_vodka]

A controlled schedule for pushes out to production would get around this issue. If the users create their own databases, they would release it at a scheduled time that makes sense to them as well as the DBA.

Having system admins uploading files whever they want to still to me is a bad idea. Furthermore, with that many databases expected to be hosted at once, it would make even MORE sense to me that it be controlled. It leads to a greater chance of hurting your other databases.

Perhaps there may be a way to create an interface to take control of these functions via command line scripting. Either or my 2 cents is to keep users out of it.

[Fenton]

If "hundreds of databases" are being created, I have to wonder if FileMaker is being used appropriately. It sounds like it is being used more like a desktop spreadsheet. I would look hard at whether the FileMaker developer could not create just a few databases that could incorporate all this data, rather than this "create a new database for every whatever."