Reliability of running FMP all the time for RemoteScripter

[BrentHedden]

I'm asking in general how reliable it is to run FileMaker Pro 13 all the time on the same server that's running FMServer or another machine dedicated to be a FM robot?  All it'll be doing is listening for RemoteScript traffic.

 

Im the past when I've used similar techniques for a robot machine, I would find that copy of FMP stuck at a dialog box, just not responding, etc every now and then.  Which is frustrating because the only way I knew it wasn't working is when end users reported it to me.  These were on PC machines, and I'm now using MAC machines, if that makes any difference.  

 

I believe the RemoteScripter has a timeout parameter, correct?  So I can at least have some level of error trapping.  Any other experience in this regard would certainly be helpful and appreciated.

[James Gill]

First off, it is generally not considered best practice to run FMS and FMP on the same machine so I'd nix that idea right off.  As far as stability is concerned, I have noticed that Filemaker is not the most stable program to keep running as a 'listener' service.  I'm running a box dedicated to converting fax confirmations into PDF's and it's not uncommon for it to crash at least 2-3 times a week.  For me, it's not that difficult to check it and make sure that it's still running, but as a consultant I can see how that would be extremely annoying if it was hosted remotely at a Client's office.  In Filemaker's defense, I have been informed that it's possible due to the way that the Filemaker files get backed up and cached during the backup process that's the root of the problem, but I don't really have any control over that.  

I've often thought about creating some type of script that would check to see what the FilemakerPro.app service was doing (Not Responding, 100% CPU cycles, etc) and then running some type of bash script or similar, but it's never been that big of an issue to just restart the app.  There are programs out there that can script the control of the mouse & keyboard so that you could go through the motions of Force quitting Filemaker, starting Filemaker and then connecting to whatever database you need to connect to, but I can't recall off the top of my head what the name of them are.