From: Melissa M. Wedig
Date: January 2003
Has anyone figured out a way to save us from ourselves when it comes to the inevitable point where multiple people need to be working with the same information?
I'm working with a small business that's developed a sustainable way to raise aquaponic fish and hydroponic basil. There's a lot of technical data and some very complex spreadsheets and databases. All of this is run off of 10 Macs plus a G4 tower that acts as a server. But you could watch the algae grow waiting for the server to respond and there's just not a lot of money for updating everything to 100BaseT.
Net result: everyone makes their own copy of the files and hoards information in little fiefdoms on their hard drives to avoid slushing through everyone else's copy of everyone else's copy of everyone else's copy. . . . The files reproduce faster than the fish!
In my last job, I worked with developers who used version control software. They checked out files to work on and then checked them back in again so there was always only one copy in one place.
It seems like such a universal issue. Has anyone developed something similar for the rest of us server-serfs? Some way to check the file out of the server, work on it locally using your own processing power, but then automatically save it all back to the server and not the local hard drive?
All of this to say, please, please, please write a book on networking and server stuff for those of us who have managed to gain some mastery one-on-one with our own computers, but who now have to learn how to share the sandbox with our coworkers and their computers too!
Thanks much!
PS. Also, a solid vote for a book on FileMaker with special emphasis on how to use it as a springboard for moving your web site from brochure-ware to form-filled functionality.
Strange. The network really shouldn't be that slow. People should be able to open the documents on the server without actually copying them to their local machines. I can't imagine what's going on. Is it possible they are actually running the application on the server? That would certainly slow things down.
In the meantime, if you're using Mac OS X, you might consider command-dragging the file you intend to copy to the local machine. That way you move it rather than copying it, which at least avoids the Version Hell problem.
Good luck!
David
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