Really, Really Slooooow...

[rhakka]

Hello all,

I have a growing relational database system I am building for my own start - up company. Soon I expect to have it hosted remotely so my partner and I can both access it from home.

Right Now i'm hosting it on my own home computer (G4/400mhz). He has a new G4, much more powerful than mine. I am cable, he is 56k.

before I go any further, on either of our machines, FMP runs really fast. we're using FMP5.

Now the probem is, we have tried to have him connect to me as a guest user, and also with filemaker Server 5 on my machine, thinking that might help. Neither way seemed to make a difference; and neither did it seem to help if FMP/server was the active application on my machine; it was extremely slow for him to run. In particular, I have a lot of separate files and portals, so to open "Contacts" it will also open "phone numbers" and "addresses"; and open files is EXTREMELY slow for my partner. In fact, if he doesn't time out while opening them, it could take a half hour to open 11 files. Then when it's running it's also painfully slow.

Now my obvious gut reaction is, he's 56k what do you expect. But my file sizes arent' that large; the entire assembly of files totals 724k at the moment across 11 files with the largest single file topping out at 176k. So I am thinking it shouldnt' be this slow, even with his paltry connection speed.

Plus, when I run FMP server, it shows no network activity or transactions while he is opening the files; not sure if that means anything but it seemed odd to me.

Any advice? He might be able to go broadband this summer, but if that isn't the problem, we have a serious issue here as the databases I am coding are basically useless to him, and they are integral to our being able to function as a business. If there is any nifty trick I dont' know to speed this up, please clue me in!

Thanks for your time.

[Steven H. Blackwell]

First off, a 56K connection will be slow. And of course you're not getting anywhere near that bandwidth as throughput. More likely in the 30 to 35 KBps area.

Second, don't run FileMAker Server and FIleMaker Pro on the same machine at the same time. Aside from being a dangerous practice, it will be very slow.

You need a separate machine for just FileMaker Server. Have it host the files. One of you will be local and fast; the otehr will be remote and slow.

Tip: Have the remote user open to a blank layout and a null found set.

HTH

Old Advance Man

[rhakka]

I'm not running them at the same time; it wouldn't even let me do that if I wanted to if I remember correctly (file is currently in use by FMP server..)

And most of the file openings are not even opening windows, it's the relational "opening" where they are opened for access but he doesn't display anything, so I don't think a blank layout would help... good tip for the other files though, thanks. If I'm wrong about that please let me know too!

So... it's sounding like there is no way to get fast remote access to FMP? I mean, even if he were only getting 10k/second these files should be opening WAY faster than they are. It would literally be faster for him to download the file itself and run it locally than it is for him to open the file for usage, which doesn't seem like it should be the case. And of course that isn't a very desirable solution.

oh please tell me FMP is usable in a remote configuration for regular usage... please...

thanks for the response old man, btw.

[ April 16, 2002, 09:33 AM: Message edited by: rhakka ]

[Kurt Knippel]

Your main problem is the 56k connection. Upping this to broadband will help, but even the fastest broadband access 1.5mbs is still about 1/10th the speed of the slowest LAN, and even slower than running a local copy.

I might suggest the following. Setup a machine in your office. An iMac or older PowerPC/G3 Mac, install Timbuktu on both this system as well as your partners. Then have you partner connect to this Mac using Timbuktu. Now he can launch Filemaker from this system and it will be running locally on your LAN, and only send screen updates to your partner. This will be significiently faster.

Your other options are making the DB available to the web and having your partner interact with a website. Or you could design the system in such as way as to allow you both to run individual copies on your own systems and then synchronize the data periodically.

[Anatoli]

We are running average traffic of 3 users over 128k line 25 databases.

Also I bet on 64k ISDN it will be 2-3 times faster, than on 56k modem. The difference between 64k ISDN -- DIGITAL -- and 56k -- ANALOG -- is incredible.

I am running videoconferencing with sound between Prague and US on 64k ISDN

[Kurt Knippel]

There is also the issue of semantics.

I think that when you have a 56k modem, this the the best rated speed possible given the communications gear and the connection type. Compression can give you the appearance of higher speeds, but it will be very subjective.

Once you get into things like 64K ISDN and other type of broadband connections then you are getting raw speeds of at least those levels. Compression/Decompression delays are eliminated and your actual throughput is increased dramatically.

[IdealData]

I have tried similar - yes it can take 15+ mins to open several files over that connection.

The problem is that the "server" is sending all the graphics and file structure to the "client". Globals can severely affect performance too.

Consider web deployment (NOT INSTANT) from the G4. It makes sense to run OS X too because its multi-threaded and consequently not prone to foreground activities "hogging" the processor.

Maybe the broadband will speed things up if you stay with basic FMP - but see if you can get a test from someone to make sure you'd be happy.

[rhakka]

well, thanks everyone, not exactly the news I was hoping to hear but... so goes it i guess.

If anyone is running FMP 5 and has a broadband connection, I need a good remote test of bb to bb remote FMP usage; please email me [email protected] if you're willing to spend a few minutes connecting to my machine (or vice versa) and test load times!

Thanks again for the help all.

[LiveOak]

Beware! So called "Broadband" cable modem connections can hit download speeds of 1,500,000 bits per second BUT as very often blocked at 128KB for upload. The cable companies prohibit by contract (and by the block) commercial server hosting on a cable connection.

Also remember that you are probably used to 100BasedT or 10BasedT ethernet connections. The fastest cable download connection is 1.5BasedT, the 128K block makes the connection 0.128BasedT. A dialup connection might be 0.035BasedT (equivalent). You local disk access is 30-50 times faster than a 100BasedT connection.

This make the dial-up access to FM data about one 140,000 thousanth of the speed of local use. Mystery solved!

The best way to access FM remotely over a dial-up connection is to use Timbuktu or PC Anywhere to access FM running on a local machine.

-bd

[rhakka]

yes, we wont be hosting the solution on a home connection, it will have basically unlimited bandwidth on the hosting end. Thanks for the heads up though!

however, if we can't use it because of our client connection speeds making it useless... well you can see why I want to test this out. Having to import/export and email data back and forth is a very inelegant solution, but basically all of our work is done through FMP so if it's too slow, it would be much more efficient for us to share data in batches, as loathesome as I find that prospect. So if anyone is willing to help me to a broadband test for usability before we commit to the true "large band" hosting, I would be eternally in your debt!

[email protected] ... and thanks, one more time, for everyone's feedback!

[T2ooo]

Hi,

I ran into a similar problem. We have a few home offices which connect via 64k ISDN to the main server. In order to speed things up and to expand the number of users who are able to connect I installed a VPN via a DSL 768/128 connection. Well, the point is that this connection is even slower than the old ISDN one. (This has nothing to do with the VPN encryption since I disabled it for testing reasons). In my point of view it