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Homebulletgrey.gifeNewsletterbulletgrey.gifVolume 36bulletgrey.gifMove Forward with c-treeACE Server

Stop Standing Still - Move Forward with c-treeACE Server

Introduction

c-treeACE has been intentionally developed such that migration between different operating modes is mostly a matter of recompiling and re-linking an existing application. With the client/server model, additional features are available and should be considered when migrating from one of FairCom's standalone operational models to the c-treeACE Server. Additional details on migration to the client/server model are provided in “Using c-treeACE” of the c‑tree Plus Programmer’s Reference Guide.

Benefits

Why choose c-treeACE Server technology over the standalone architecture for an existing application? Many applications that started out requiring only single user access may need to grow to support multi-user access. While the multiuser standalone model has filled that need for many years, it lacks features more robust applications need to support.

The c-treeACE Server offers many advanced features not available in the standalone models due to the multithreaded core kernel technology.

Bound Servers for Ease of Deployment

model - bound server

 

Did you know that the c-treeACE Server engine can also be bound directly to your application? Much like the traditional standalone model you may already be familiar with, the bound server model is a perfect transition model. It is also very easy to deploy as it can be simply copied into your existing application installers.

The bound server model also offers incredible performance by avoiding all of the communication overhead of the application threads. Or, configure it to include communications logic for remote clients and/or monitoring for a truly flexible solution. True multithreaded server performance is directly available to your application.

How-To

In nearly every case, migrating an existing application to take advantage of the c-treeACE Server is almost effortless, and can be done in less than a day. Check through the following items and you'll be on your way in record time.

  • Link your existing application to the c-treeACE V9 multithreaded library, mtclient.lib.
  • Copy or move your existing data and index files to the working directory of c-treeACE. You could also consider the LOCAL_DIRECTORY configuration keyword to point c-treeACE to your existing data location. Be aware that you will need to remove existing transaction log files as previous versions of these files are incompatible with c-treeACE. Follow these steps to ensure a clean start with c-treeACE.
  • Rebuild indexes to take advantage of larger page sizes. Standalone models default to a 2048 byte index node size, while c-treeACE Servers since V8.14 default to 8192 bytes. Increasing this allows more keys per node, as well as larger keys, that frequently arise when creating complex indexes via SQL.
  • Switch your initialization to InitISAMXtd() and add the client user name and password to access the server. Use the Xtd() Function API calls that allow the user credentials and server name to be specified. You can include these in your standalone builds, as they are simply ignored in those models.
  • Consider multithreading your application for enhanced scalability and performance.
  • Access the power of c-treeACE in your application immediately.

To take fullest advantage of server performance and features the following information is recommended reading:

Flexible Licensing

When you're ready to start to consider the licensing impact of your migration to servers, be sure the appropriate business liaison on your side contacts a member of FairCom's business development team. Licensing for the c-treeACE server engine is different from the standalone licensing, and, like the technical migration, the licensing migration isn't as difficult as it may seem at first blush. Our business development team works with your side to understand your unique application and market needs so, together, we can develop a model that works for you.

Move Forward!

c-treeACE Server technology offers a huge array of performance benefits and advanced features today's applications demand. With FairCom's commitment to ease of use and over 30 years of development know-how, we have intentionally included the ability to quickly migrate to our advanced database models. Contact your nearest FairCom office to see how our experienced engineering team can help you take advantage of these great features today.

See Also

RadioGrupo (RG) is a group of seven radio stations located in Aguascalientes, a city in the center of México with a population of one million. Founded in 1936, RG has an estimated 70% market share according to one recent survey. Microsistemas de Aguascalientes provides technology consulting services to a number of industries including radio broadcasting, government, and commerce.

RG needed to provide its radio stations a new level of control and sophistication to handle creating the contracts, scheduling the commercials as stipulated in the contracts, controlling the invoice generation for transmitted spots, collecting the invoices, reporting comprehensive information, and forecasting for the future. Because RG had no technical staff, they turned to a local consultant, José Luis Gómez Serrano from Microsistemas de Aguascalientes, to develop this new system. Given the requirements of this project, Microsistemas de Aguascalientes proposed to use FairCom technology. Mr. Gómez had used c-tree Plus and the c-tree Servers on several other projects with excellent results. He believed that this new project was perfectly suited to this technology.

As the team from Microsistemas de Aguascalientes worked on the traffic engine, they were pleased by the performance they achieved with FairCom's technology: a one-year contract (about 15 spots a day) could be programmed in a snap, at a rate of 170 scheduled spots per second. For each spot in a contract, the system must find a suitable location on the schedule, ensuring that the specific contract constraints are met.

The entire project was based on a three-tiered model: a graphical interface using Borland's VCL model, the business rules based heavily on the C++ object paradigm, and the server interaction using the c-tree Server. This strategy worked well, particularly when developing the finer elements of the system such as the assignment of the spots on the schedule. The ample c-tree Plus API gives the programmer an assortment of functions that make it easy, powerful, and efficient to manage a database in a complex situation.

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