I have not noted any comments in the manuals but the "host" definitely needs
to open ALL the files, not just the main ones. This happens automatically if
you use FM server, but not otherwise. Even on the server, you do not notice
if it gets errors on some of the files unless you look in the error logs
frequently. We had one of the rarely used files go bad without noticing it
and it went on long enough that we had no usable backups for it. Opening all
of them daily you notice this sort of thing immediately. It is painfully
slow opening that many files.
I don't know the Mac world, but for PCs I solved the problem by generating a
Startup.102 that people open instead of ebase.102. It opens all the files,
has buttons to get to several other FileMaker databases we have, makes sure
that the person identifies themselves so that the modified by and added by
fields are correct and has a database of how-to type help information that
details our specific proceedures. There is nothing PC specific in it so I
expect it would work on a Mac.
I can send it to anyone who wants it, but you will definitely need to
customize it as it as some of it is quite specific to our organization
(including our logo as decoration).
