William,

>From what I gather, this problem seems limited to text indexes. 
Maybe switching to integer indexes would be the lesser of evils 
until there a acceptable resolution. I began using them after 
suggestions from others on the list.

Maybe others would add to this, but his is what I do.
All tables have an autonum column, except tables that are the 
"parent" in parent-child relationships. I typically name these 
columns tblSerial, and serve no purpose other than to identify 
individual rows as needed.

In parent/child relationships (people/phone#s, check 
headers/check detail...) each have one common column, typically 
TranID, assigned at insert.

I never give my users access to the R> so I don't use foreign keys 
and manage those relationships through code.

So, using GL accounts as an example, if you wanted to query 
transactions by acct#, the first step is to "choose" the account 
which may have any size gl Acct# (text) and use the integer 
returned to query the transaction table(s) for that indexed integer.

I doubt this is news to you... but somtimes an old idea triggers a 
new thought.

Ben Petersen



On 21 Aug 2002, at 9:50, William Mason wrote:

> I'm not buying into the hardware thing.  I MAY if the removal of FK's didn't
> fix it (in my case) every time.  Anyway, from a time/cost point of view it
> is more effective to deal with the lone piece of software that is having
> trouble than to check every driver and/or NIC and/or hardware component of
> every workstation on a LAN.  And what a thought - a printer driver could
> bring a company to its knees.  We operate in "mission critical" mode at
> times and I for one do not like to sit and bite my nails waiting for the one
> bad NIC card or rogue printer driver or loose patch cable or dusty keyboard
> on one PC to trash a corporate database, stop 20 other users from working
> and cost us (literally) THOUSANDS of dollars per hour.
> 
> I can understand the frustration from both the developer and RBTI points of
> view.  It is an extremely difficult situation to replicate, and therefore
> fix.  As a developer, our apps appear fragile and/or bug-ridden, in turn
> lowering the confidence in those that use (and pay for) our apps.  We
> address the issue with RBTI but cannot replicate the problem so they have
> their hands tied.  And ultimately we all end up in the conundrum of blame
> without resolution (how many times has a software vendor said the problem
> was with Windows and Microsoft said it was with the vendor's application?).
> 
> However, in my opinion, something has to be done.  Databases are all about
> DATA, and losing data is simply not an option - having a weakness in a
> "feature" is one thing, but having an Achilles heel in the core
> functionality is another (what if Excel did math wrong if some other user's
> CD ROM driver was bad?).  Treating the symptoms and not the disease is a
> shortsighted answer that only provides a temporary and false sense of
> security.  I can't run a RELOAD every minute of the day and I can't tell a
> business to stop functioning while I "fix a problem".  I will continue to do
> what I can to diagnose the problem and find the source of it, so that I may
> one day share that information with this community and RBTI, who I am sure
> would do their best to fix it.  But, I would hope that RBTI would also
> realize that this is a problem that is only occurring with their software
> (to my knowledge) and that it is very costly to me and those that I serve,
> both from a financial and confidence perspective.  And without that
> confidence, those that control the purse strings may be more apt to consider
> other products/developers for the reliability that they pay for.
> 
> RBTI has always gone the extra mile, and I'm sure that this case is no
> different.  I would very much enjoy the continuance of this dialog,
> hopefully with the input of both experienced developers and RBTI staff to
> see if there is indeed a way to remedy the issue that is feasible from both
> sides, yielding an even greater product.
> 
> My $0.04
> 
> William Mason
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Anthony Schmidt" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Sent: Wednesday, August 21, 2002 7:52 AM
> Subject: Re: Corrupt Indexes
> 
> 
> > Bernie:
> >
> > The response I received from RBTI tech support was that the corruption
> > (data and indexes) that my client was experiencing was related to network
> > problems.
> >
> > It appears that they were right.
> >
> > Our problems seemed to be related to a bad printer driver on the Terminal
> > Server. The bad printer driver would cause short and intermittent database
> > disconnects. Since we deleted and reinstalled the printer driver
> > (beginning of this July), we haven't experienced any data or index
> > corruption. I'm not suggesting that your problem is due to a bad printer
> > driver, but rather that it can be something totally unrelated to R:Base.
> >
> > I discovered that the RBase 6.5++ database is open for corruption not only
> > during write operations, but also whenever an "Edit" or "Enter using" form
> > merely accesses and displays data. I think this is due to the concurrency
> > control that's part of these forms.
> >
> > This susceptibility to corruption due to network interruptions is
> > something that seems that file server based databases are subject to. I
> > think that client/server databases might be more forgiving since the
> > connection can be established by and on the server.
> >
> > I also would think that the use of disconnected record sets would limit
> > the exposure to such corruption.
> >
> > I hope that the RBTI dream team improves the "industrial strength" of
> > R:Base to address these types of data and index corruption.
> >
> > My $.02
> >
> > Tony
> >
> > Anthony Schmidt, JD
> > President
> > The Computery Ltd.
> > One East Main Street
> > Bay Shore, NY   11706
> >
> > 631-665-8100 Voice
> > 6310969-5988 Fax
> >
> > http://www.computeryltd.com
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > 08/21/2002 10:06 AM
> > Please respond to rbase-l
> >
> >         To:     [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> >         cc:     (bcc: Anthony Schmidt/BayShore/SGU_LN)
> >         Subject:        Re: Corrupt Indexes
> >
> >
> > David,
> > Why do you feel that it is necessary to pack keys every day.  Is this a
> > signal that you suspect the "Industrial Strength" engine has a problem?
> > I have one customer that has corruption repeatedly and I can't get to the
> > bottom of it.  I tried Pack Keys once and it didn't help.  They are
> > running
> > dos and win 6.5++ 1.851
> > We've tried rotating the unuse (if there is such a word) of workstations
> > to
> > see if one of them is causing the problem.
> > No positive results so far.
> >
> > Bernie Lis
> > Megabytes, Inc.
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "David M. Blocker" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> > Sent: Wednesday, August 21, 2002 9:07 AM
> > Subject: Re: Corrupt Indexes
> >
> >
> > > Because of the importance of indexes, the DAILY backup routine that I
> > have
> > > all my clients do does the following:
> > >
> > > SET MULTI OFF
> > > CONNECT  dbname
> > >   -  abort if you can't connect
> > > AUTOCHK dbname
> > >   - abort if problem
> > > PACK KEYS (rebuilds all indexes)
> > > COPY .... (backup)
> > >
> > > David Blocker
> >
> >
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