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    #16
    Re: unstable

    been working on my problems today and we seem to have got somewhere.

    we disabled the continious back up on idrive and this has improved the speed massively. we just need to decide whats more important, speed or continious back ups. think we will opt for speed and accept 1 days data loss in the event something goes wrong.

    we also used 'ca etrust' anti virus. we had already configured it to ignore the application folder on the server. i hadnt thought about the shadowed folders. i havet not configured etrust on each pc to ignore the shadow folder.

    thanks for all the help. we feel we can handle a few unhandled exceptions for now if we have the speed.

    a thought on alphas fields not accepting user data which results in the form needing to be re loaded, i thought if i put a refresh command after the form is loaded, this might clear nay issues which are causing the error. any thoughts?

    Comment


      #17
      Re: unstable

      I am sorry I can't help with a technical response regarding stability, but one very simple thing we have found with the speed of data entry is that if I design a moderately large form (lets say, filling a 1024x796 screen) and also decide to use any type of gradient background it kills the data entry speed for the very fast operators (true touch typists). I avoid the use of gradient on anything but dialogues now and even try and avoin translucency if possible. It may be related to the video hardware we have installed on the base machines (ATI X300 built in) so possibly it may not apply to everyone.

      Not sure if thats helpful!
      Chris Tanti
      Technical Support

      Nuance & Fathom Ltd - The data-driven marketing agency

      Comment


        #18
        Re: unstable

        more... on fields not accepting data

        i was working on a form and opened it from the control panel. the fields would accept no data, i closed and re opened from the control panel and still not working. did this a couple of times.

        i have a script to force close all tables - i ran this script and then re opened the form and it worked fine.

        it appears that some table is not being closed properly when a form is being closed which is having a knock on effect when we are opening another form to work on.

        can anyone advise how i can make sure when a form closes the underlying table / session / or anything else, is closed.

        thanks

        Comment


          #19
          Re: unstable

          Richard,
          I have been experiencing often forms and tables (mostly tables) remaining open after the associated form closes. I discover this in developement when I close a form and then go to CP and try and access the table in design mode, which I am then told my table is open and any changes will not be saved. It has caused me to always keep a button on my main menu form for a5_forceclosetables().

          The one that keeps rearing itself, which I never experienced in v5-v8 is the code editor saving a script to the wrong file (see thread). This one keeps happening to me, and it is very frustrating. I cannot reproduce it but it is happening, again just yesterday.

          http://msgboard.alphasoftware.com/al...ad.php?t=75614

          Thanks for your feedback on resolutions of the problems you have managed to overcome.
          Mike W
          __________________________
          "I rebel in at least small things to express to the world that I have not completely surrendered"

          Comment


            #20
            Re: unstable

            gmeredith17 said:

            I don't have V9 but feel you really need to push to get these issues addressed before the next release of Alpha (V10). Otherwise that is it, no more bug fixes and you will have to either live with it or pay to upgrade and hope the problems have been fixed or will be fixed in that version.
            Yes, I tried this approach on one of the bugs I had and actually got a reply from Selwyn, who sent me a number of e-mails on the problem, however before we resolved the issue the e-mails stopped and even though I sent numerous follow up e-mails I did not receive any further replies on this issue from anyone at Alpha!

            Unless the faults are fixed this time around on this version this will be the last time I upgrade! There are just too many problems with this version that I have had which have not yet had a solution. While I accept that Alpha Five is on the whole a great DB program and up until now I have been very satisfied with the support and the software, I am starting to feel that Alpha Five is suffering because of its own success. I get approx. 10 e-mails every week from Alpha offering me special offers on new software, whereas all I really want is some response to the problems that I report...

            Comment


              #21
              Re: unstable

              mike,

              that exact same thing happend to me today. i did notice it straight away and was able to delete from the incorrect tab.

              Comment


                #22
                Re: unstable

                Richard,

                I think there bust be some sort of mirror between here and Sunderland because all our software, right down to e-trust seems to be the same!

                One thing I have changed is, we dont use shadowed database anymore. All the Runtimes and my platinum copy point to data on the server machine and e-trust is then told on each machine to ignore that folder and also the exe file per machine. This gave a significant speed increase. I zip to a portable drive every night and develop at home, then restore in the morning. When we shadowed it seemed that not all files where being updated when the shadow database was refreshed causing incompatibility problems around the office. We have been using this system for about a year now without much problem.

                Comment


                  #23
                  Re: unstable

                  lance,

                  are there possible issues with everyone pointing to the server (if not seems pointless having shadowed).

                  i like the idea of this.

                  Comment


                    #24
                    Re: unstable

                    Get the odd record locking problem, but they are very scarce and as I said have been doing this for about a year now

                    Comment


                      #25
                      Re: unstable

                      Wow! This is SCARY stuff. I just ordered version 9 for a client, to prepare to build them an app in V9 and I'm reading about all this instability. What an embarrassment it will be if, once developed and live, they start to have these kinds of issues. It amazes me that Alpha Software hypes all the virtues of V9 constantly, yet can't put out a more stable product. Did they release it too soon? There are veteran developers running into problems, such as Cal, and I just can't believe what I'm reading here. The ultimate insult is an Access developer threatening to go back to Access because of these issues.

                      I don't think it's sufficient for Alpha Software to hide behind the "mistakes happen" excuse when problems become this severe. We who develop professional applications for companies have a reasonable expectation that the developer's tools will pass some reasonable standard, not run the risk of being branded as incapable and unprofessional when your well-designed application is subject to crashing and instability.

                      I certainly hope Alpha Software has made the fixes for these problems their highest priority. As I said earlier, I'm now sufficiently scared, and nervous, that once I put my application into production I will need to defend an otherwise well-designed application due only to the fact that the product was released too early. It's not an excuse to my client that "Well, it's just a problem with this version of Alpha Five. I'm sure they'll fix it eventually."

                      Sorry to vent so much. This is my livelihood we're talking about.

                      Jeff Fried

                      Comment


                        #26
                        Re: unstable

                        Originally posted by Alastair View Post
                        Jeff,

                        I have had similar problems with browses doing weird things in design mode on an XP Pro machine. Just the other day I renamed the column of a browse and after completing the change of properties, most of the browse disappeared, not quite like your example but similar. I also swapped to form view and then back to design and the browse came back, but there is definetly something strange going on!

                        Up to now I have only had this fault occur once, but problems like the screen corruption (see previous post) are happening each time I start Alpha.
                        I think this is a memory problem of some sort in design mode. Win98 had a utility you could run to prompt you when memory was running low so you could save and exit. But XP doesn't have such a feature that I am aware of. The crash just comes without warning. Your best bet is to save your forms often while designing - regardless of the OS you are using.
                        Robin

                        Discernment is not needed in things that differ, but in those things that appear to be the same. - Miles Sanford

                        Comment


                          #27
                          Re: unstable

                          Originally posted by Lance Gurd View Post
                          One thing I have changed is, we dont use shadowed database anymore. All the Runtimes and my platinum copy point to data on the server machine...
                          Lance,
                          How many users do you have on your network?

                          Rui

                          Comment


                            #28
                            Re: unstable

                            5

                            Comment


                              #29
                              Re: unstable

                              Originally posted by Jeff Fried View Post
                              Wow! This is SCARY stuff. ...
                              I certainly hope Alpha Software has made the fixes for these problems their highest priority. ...
                              This is my livelihood we're talking about.
                              Mine too. And I believe they are working diligently on this. They have my app and have found at least one issue that may be affecting this. The big problem is that I can't tell them how to reliably reproduce the problems.
                              Originally posted by richard2007 View Post
                              are there possible issues with everyone pointing to the server (if not seems pointless having shadowed).

                              i like the idea of this.
                              The main issue would be speed. If your network is fast enough to handle it, you don't have to run shadowed. Of course, that will also mean more network traffic which could potentially affect other apps as well. It all depends on how fast your network is and what other programs are running on it. I have one customer that has been using A5 since v1, never runs shadowed, and has never had a problem. I've run tests and can easily see that it runs slightly faster when shadowed but the users don't complain. Since one person there makes periodic application changes and many users don't turn off their computers even on weekends, they prefer not to have to worry about re-optimizing the workstations.

                              I suppose if the speed is slow enough you might have other problems. But if the speed is decent, I think you'll be OK.

                              Comment


                                #30
                                Re: unstable

                                Mograce said:

                                I think this is a memory problem of some sort in design mode. Win98 had a utility you could run to prompt you when memory was running low so you could save and exit. But XP doesn't have such a feature that I am aware of. The crash just comes without warning. Your best bet is to save your forms often while designing - regardless of the OS you are using.
                                You might be right about the memory issue, however the application didn't crash this time! Some of the browse coloumns disappeared in the design view, I then swapped views to form view and back to design view and there was the browse back to normal. It seems to be a screen refresh glitch, but I am no expert. I am however unhappy about the amount of glitches that I keep finding with V9 (I suppose they will decrease as new patches are issued, but I don't like to feel I am a beta tester for software when I have paid full price for it!)

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