ciru@vaxa.cc.uwa.oz.au (08/05/90)
NETWORK HYPERCARD USERS..............HELP PLEASE!
I would greatly appreciate any help from those of you who have some experience
with using Hypercard on a network. Here is what I plan to do followed by some
questions that I have.
At our newly established Research Institute I have just written and have up
and running a fairly complex ordering and grant management system using
Hypercard. Initially, the system will run on one Macintosh, however, very
shortly we hope to link at least two Macs together so that administrator has
access to the relevent information stored within the grant management stack
that is linked in with the ordering system. It would also be optimal if
several of the key personel within the Institute could have direct access to
both the ordering and Grant management stacks from their offices rather than
have to go to the Mac that is designated for ordering.
Of course, I would have liked to have used a 'proper' relational and multiuser
database for this task, but as funds are tight we opted for using Hypercard
and the system we have come up with seems to work well so far, within the
confines of a one Mac environment.
Our system as I have said is made up of several stacks. There is a 'front
end' stack (or in a way a 'home' stack) from which you can get to the other
stacks.
The main stack is the Ordering system. When a person fills in a new order,
they have to put in a cost estimate (before they can print a requisition) for
the item they are ordering. This estimate, when the order is finished, is
then subtracted from the amount of money available in the particular grant
that the item is being funded from and this action is accomplished by going to
another stack which is the grant management stack. (This of course happens
without the user's knowledge by locking the screen etc). There is also an
Item stack which is a catalogue of all of the items that are bought on a
regular basis by the scientists within the Institute and this stack is also
linked to the ordering stack.
As you can see, this system is moderately complex and may present some
problems if run on a network.
My understanding at this point is that Hypercard (including version 2.0) is
not multiuser, ie, only one person can 'edit' or change/add to a stack at a
time. Another person can only view or browse a stack on a network that has
already been opened by someone else.
At this point we intend to run this system over a LOCAL TALK network using the
"EasyShare" product rather than dedicating a Mac as a server and using
Appleshare.
My questions are as follows:
1. Am I asking too much of this system to run smoothly on a network
when there is a possibility that more than one person may want to use the
system at a time. Remember that this may mean that although at a single point
in time one person may only be using the ordering stack, but that when they
click a finished button, this stack temporarily then interacts with the grant
management stack. If the grant management stack is already open by someone
else checking to see how much money they have then the operation may run into
trouble as the stack can not be modified if already open?
2. Are there any external commands out there which deal with the
complexities of running such a Hypercard system on a network? Such externals
would include ones to check to see if other stacks are open etc etc.
3. Does Hypercard inherently have a 'warning' system built in which
notifies a user if the stack is already being used?
4. Will this system run OK using "EasyShare"?
5. Does such a Hyercard system become a little 'slow' running at local
talk speed? Should we seriously consider using Ethernet? I tested out the
system the other day on a friends Appleshare system and was alarmed at the
'slowness' and the amount of disk activity that went on before the system
'settled down' after a complete order had been put through. Running on a
single Mac (SE/30 and above) the operations are very quick.
I use several external commands in the stacks, including popup menus etc.
6. Will Hypercard version 2.0 alleviate any of the associated problems
with working such systems on a network?
Again, I would greatly appreciate any input from anyone with some helpful
ideas as regards how we can run this system smoothly on a network, baring in
mind that our Institute's funds are 'finite' at the present time.
THANKS IN ADVANCE FOR ANY HELP POSTED.
Yours sincerely
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* Mike Schon-Hegrad *
* Research Officer *
* West Australian Research Institute for Child Health *
* Princess Margaret Hospital for Children *
* Subiaco *
* Western Australia 6008 *
* *
* CIRU@vaxa.uwa.oz *
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