OS-Still not sure?

[Ricardo]

I am going to upgrade my server-(hardware). But i am still unsure as to which OS runs Fm Server 5.5 the best.

Is it OS X or NT?

We have a mixture of PC's and MAC's which access our current Fm Server.

Pros and Cons of both OS would be great.

Thanks in advance,

Ricardo.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

User Windows 2000 Server or Macintosh OS X. Windows NT is an old technology. Both W2K and OS X have strong advantages, altough there is a significant problem with the automatic backups on OS X. Be sure to use FileMaker Server 5.5.

See the Server Best Practices White Paper at

http://www.filemaker.com/downloads/pdf/fms_best_practices.pdf

HTH

Old Advance Man

[Ricardo]

Thanks for the reply.

What are the problems with the automatic back-up using OS X?

Given the choice which OS would you choose - W200 Sever or OS X

Thanks again,

Ricardo.

[Anatoli]

WNT is good, proven and secure technology.

W2K is based on NT (good thing) with increased multithreading (even better) insecure (search web) which is no point for considerations if you are not connected to Internet.

Some of the W2000 servers exhibits nasty habit of "eating themselves" and only solution is reinstall.

MacX still very young but promising. Do you like to play with Unix commands?

[Kurt Knippel]

Personally if I would ever recommend a Filemaker Server to anyone, it would always be one running Mac OS 9.2.2, or even 8.6, both are stable and require little if any maintenance.

OS X, Win2000 and NT are all still just too complicated and fussy for stability in regards to database and web serving.

Mac servers running Filemaker is pretty much a set it and forget it proposition.

[schubidb]

We are using FMServer5.5 under RedHat Linux 7.1 and are very very happy with it. FMServer serves 48 databases very stable in peak times up to 10users sitting on PC and Mac. The OS is free, there are a number of good backup programs, you could even write you own one, you may use the ones that are delivered with FMServer. In addition, the OS is very stable. No shutdown/restart/crash in the 4 months we have it. And the remote admin plug-in allows convienient administration.

Greetings from France

Daniel

[Ricardo]

Thanks everyone.

But what are the issues with the automatic back-up on Mac OS X?

Thanks again.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

The issue with backups for FileMAker Server 5.5 running on OS X is that the automated backups do not work reliably if they are set for multiple instances. You can use a Perl script to work around this. FMI is fully aware of this issue.

Contrary to Kurt's recommendation, I would not run FileMaker Server 5.5 on one of the "Classic" Mac OS. But until the backup bug is fixed, that remains an option.

Old Advance Man