Ghost Client Free

[Margarita Lovvorn]

Ihave connected users with 0 files open. I also have some users that are listed multiple times, one with files open, and the rest with 0 files open. I've tried disconnecting them through the Admin Console and through the command line, but neither worked. I have the 'set maximum idle time allowed for FileMaker Clients' option set in FileMaker Server as well as the 'Disconnect user from FileMaker Server when idle' option in the client's Privilege Set, but that too does not appear to working correctly. The only way that I can get rid of the duplicate users is to restart the server.

I also have "authentication failed" errors in the log viewer. I'm not sure that's the cause of the problem because some users that have failed authentication can disconnect from the server just fine and reconnect without having a duplicate connection, but I will investigate it further.

Some users have multiple older versions of FileMaker installed on their workstation, like versions 5 & 8, but they only use the current version (11) to open the database. That wouldn't contribute to this problem, would it?

The launcher file no doubht is set to open with the default "admin/blank" credentials and those don't match the account in the target file. But FM does try to pull open the target file with those "admin/blank" credentials and that fails and cause the authentication error in the event log.

The ghost connections don't really cause any distress other than taking up resources on the server. I only found out about the ghost connections when we hit our connection limit (I know my license doesn't restrict the number of simultaneous connections, but I wanted to set one anyways). Users were saying they were getting an error message when trying to open the database(s). I temporarily resolved that problem by bumping up the connection limit and then restarting the server.

Other than that, ghost users do not report any issues. They just show up multiple times (2+) in the Connected Clients tab in the Admin Console. Their first entry in the list will show 0 Open DBs, and the next one will show the actual number of Open DBs (ranging from 1-5).

a typical scenario would be that a ghost connection is because a client machine crashed or the network connection to it was interrupted and FMS wasn't able to communicate with that client for a "graceful" disconnect. Typically though those ghosts would disappear after a while as FMS figures out those clients are not there anymore. Are you saying they don't go away by the end of the day?

The ghost connections do not go away by the end of the day. I have about 100 connections now with 0 DBs open, and some of them have been connected since right after the last server restart, which was about 2 weeks ago.

If I try to disconnect a user who is performing an heavy search, someone who had his computer crashed or someone had to forcequit FMP, his connection keeps alive and slowing down the server as it is shown in the statistics tab as that user was doing so when disconnected. I believe this only happens when the user is stressing the server.

Sometimes I've waited for days to see if those ghost clients would disappear with out result. I've also tried to stop the database server normally without result. Most of the times, if I try not to restore from a backup to restore the service quickly, some files start verification when opening...

I have the same scenario since I was using FMS Adv 10, the only difference was that with FMS 10, those ghost clients did not show up in the admin console although I'm pretty sure they were also there.

Updating to version 11.0.2.217 did not resolve the ghost connection issue. However, I did confirm one potential cause of the ghost connections. We require our users to change their passwords every X amount of days. If the user's password is expired, it will register in the logs as an "authentication failed" error, and when the user changes their password, FileMaker Server will create another connection for that user, while still keeping the previous connection.

So, It was not a problem with users authentication if you still have those ghost users. I also have authentication failed errors in my logs, but my ghost clients do not depend on having those auth errors as some users become ghosts without authentication errors.

What's the link between the admin console and the users though? The admin console has been a sore point ever since the current java version was introduced. You shouldn't keep it open longer than you need it to work with so normally you wouldn't see any disconnect issues there.

Authentication errors happen frequently because the file is still set up to log in with a certain account or the launcher file is but the hosted files use different accounts or EA. In this scenario, every single connect to a hosted file will produce an authentication error in the logs.

I suffer from the problem described here. In my case the application synchronize data with an external MySQL table. Sometimes the source External SQL no longer available. This causes an error and I think leaves blocked the script from running the operation. This forces the user to close your FileMaker Pro inappropriately. Such this may be the cause of the appearance of ghost clients.

Sorry I think I did not explain my self properly. If I discconect a user who is stressing the server with a long search for example, then that user becomes a ghost and his connection will never dissapear.Therefore, I see a connection between a user stressing the server and disconnecting him using the admin console and so, I guess a user stressing the server and force clossing his connection will cause the same. In both cases, the server will keep stressed.

I havent seen any evidence of user load and disconnects either, in fact I see almost the opposite, there is no or few chances of getting rid of users stressing the servers, as when I try to, they keep alive forever. damm ghosts!

I did performance monitoring on my server (xserve with 8 cores, 12Gb of unused RAM, SSD HD to store production files and 1Gb network ) and in my application. As a result, I changed some processes and scripts. Right now, my performance issues are caused only by advanced users who can perform non standard searches in non standard layouts with calculated fields or related fields. In the past, with previous versions of FMS I had no problem in disconnecting them, but now I cant, and the only wayout I see is not allowing them to access those layouts what will considerably reduce their autonomy.

I experienced an issue with Ghost users just today. One user contacted me saying that a simple search resulted in his FileMaker client freezing. For whatever reason, users then started appearing multiple times in the console - apparently databases they were already logged into began freezing and/or quitting them out. Each time they re-logged in (only to kicked off again) FMS Console recorded them again. AT this point the Console become unresponsive - it is impossible to disconnect users and some databases will not respond to the command to close. The FileMaker Service will then refuse to stop, leaving a hardware restart as the only option.

FileMaker Server 11 (I am running FMSA 11.0v3 on a Windows 2003 Server) is flakey to the point of major frustration and embarrassment. I just wish FileMaker were not so distracted with Bento, and get back to fixing these debilitating problems...especially when FM11 has been out for something like 14 months now.

I'm suffering from this same issue, and while it's not usually a primary user issue, it really kills your day when it's a developer who has to force-close for whatever reason, and then remains as ghost client in role of modifying the database. So even though you can connect again, you cannot manage the database at all from anywhere until you get rid of the ghosts.

And the only way it seems at this point to get rid of ghosts is to restarted the darn server service and force everyone out. So development has to take a powder for the day, if you want to keep it up for your clients, and then wait for a window to restart.

One user contacted me saying that a simple search resulted in his FileMaker client freezing. For whatever reason, users then started appearing multiple times in the console - apparently databases they were already logged into began freezing and/or quitting them out. Each time they re-logged in (only to kicked off again) FMS Console recorded them again. AT this point the Console become unresponsive - it is impossible to disconnect users and some databases will not respond to the command to close. The FileMaker Service will then refuse to stop, leaving a hardware restart as the only option.

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