Filepro-list Digest, Vol 200, Issue 26

Bill Randall breadran01 at gmail.com
Wed Sep 23 12:05:15 PDT 2020


We send our condolences to the family and friends of Stuart Werner.
His many years of educating filePro users at our conferences was invaluable.
We have lost a wonderful man and a great friend to the entire filePro 
community.

Bill

On 9/22/2020 9:47 PM, Stuart Werner via Filepro-list wrote:
> Please remove sllw32.gmail.com from your mailing list
>
>   |-----Original Message-----
>   |From: Filepro-list On Behalf Of filepro-list-request at lists.celestial.com
>   |Sent: Tuesday, September 22, 2020 3:22 PM
>   |To: filepro-list at lists.celestial.com
>   |Subject: Filepro-list Digest, Vol 200, Issue 26
>   |
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>   |When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
>   |than "Re: Contents of Filepro-list digest..."
>   |
>   |
>   |Today's Topics:
>   |
>   |   1. GetNext loops (Richard Veith)
>   |   2. RE: index rebuilds (Richard Kreiss)
>   |   3. Re: GetNext loops (Richard D. Williams)
>   |
>   |
>   |----------------------------------------------------------------------
>   |
>   |Message: 1
>   |Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2020 18:28:13 +0000
>   |From: Richard Veith <richard.veith at smrresearch.com>
>   |To: "filepro-list at lists.celestial.com"
>   |	<filepro-list at lists.celestial.com>
>   |Subject: GetNext loops
>   |Message-ID:
>   |	<MN2PR13MB3151B10F4352B8814690D57FEF3B0 at MN2PR13MB3151
>   |.namprd13.prod.outlook.com>
>   |
>   |Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"
>   |
>   |In a lookup followed by a loop using GetNext, is there some limiting
> factor
>   |other than making sure all variables have a defined size, and that
> PFTOKSIZE
>   |is big enough?
>   |
>   |Here is our situation.  We use FilePro 5.7 on a Windows PC (Windows 7
>   |Professional, 64-bit OS, 16 GB ram), with no network involved.  Everything
>   |runs in a single machine.  We have a monthly process (executing from a
> batch
>   |file using DREPORT) that steps through some 19 million records, and for
> most
>   |of them does lookups to another FilePro database of nearly 30 million
>   |records, where the GetNext loop may find multiple, even hundreds,
>   |sometimes thousands, of relevant matches in the second DB.  Both files
>   |continually grow in size.  When we first ran into problems where the
> program
>   |would abort, after consulting this list, we made sure all the variables
> had
>   |defined sizes (which had not been true prior to that).  That solved our
>   |problem for a while.  Then as time went by, we ran into the problem again,
>   |and began increasing PFTOKSIZE (there is no automatic processing, and no
>   |CALLS or form processing in this program).  That worked up to a point, and
>   |then ceased to be effective.  For ex
>   | ample, recently, the program would abort with a PFTOKSIZE of 200000 and
>   |about 298,400 records to go.  Increasing PFTOKSIZE to 250000 still
> resulted in
>   |an abort, but only about 270,000 records to go.  Increasing to 400000
> resulted
>   |in an abort with only about 86,000 records to go.  And further increases
> had
>   |no effect.  And there is nothing wrong with the records near the end of
> the
>   |file, because if we split the 19 million records in half so to speak
> (i.e., two
>   |selection sets), each half runs fine.
>   |
>   |To test the suspicion that it is related to the number of times GetNext is
>   |executed, we added a counter to the loop, and discovered that if, for any
>   |single record in the 19 million, we do no more than about 750 loops, the
>   |program would not abort.  But between that and 765 loops, it will still
> abort.
>   |
>   |To test this even more, I wrote a simple program that was devoid of all
> else
>   |except the GetNext looping, and it is included below.  The program is
>   |executed using DREPORT.  Whether PFTOKSIZE is 600000 or 800000, with the
>   |maximum number of loops set at 800, it always aborts with about 16,900,400
>   |records left to go out of about 19,500,000.  Assuming that on most records
> it
>   |really is doing 800 loops, it seems to do about 2 billion loops before
> dying.
>   |The Windows ?error? message simply says ?dreport.exe has stopped
>   |working.?
>   |
>   |Any suggestions?
>   |
>   |  1  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If: ' 2020-09-16  Test of excessive looping
>   |       Then: ' -------------------------------------
>   |  2  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If:
>   |       Then: declare cnt(9,.0)  ' counter
>   |  3  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If:
>   |       Then: ma(20,*) = 7  'match string (w/ zip as a starting point)
>   |  4  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If: '  for the purposes of this test, not requiring an exact
> match
>   |       Then: lookup tnts = rt17  k=ma i=0 -NG
>   |  5  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |loop   ? If: not tnts
>   |      Then: END
>   |  6  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If:
>   |       Then: cnt = cnt + "1"
>   |  7  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If: cnt GT "800"
>   |       Then: END
>   |  8  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If:
>   |       Then: getnext tnts; goto loop
>   |  9  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |       ? If:
>   |       Then: END
>   |
>   |-------------- next part --------------
>   |An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
>   |URL: <http://mailman.celestial.com/pipermail/filepro-
>   |list/attachments/20200922/80569746/attachment.html>
>   |
>   |------------------------------
>   |
>   |Message: 2
>   |Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2020 18:59:37 +0000
>   |From: Richard Kreiss <rkreiss at gccconsulting.net>
>   |To: "'filepro-list at lists.celestial.com'"
>   |	<filepro-list at lists.celestial.com>
>   |Subject: RE: index rebuilds
>   |Message-ID:
>   |	<MN2PR04MB6767DAFCB74AC7E4A526A7CBB73B0 at MN2PR04MB67
>   |67.namprd04.prod.outlook.com>
>   |
>   |Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>   |
>   |This may be an odd question to ask after over 30 years working with
> filePro.
>   |
>   |Does anyone know if Auto processing runs during index rebuilds?
>   |
>   |I have a client who is trying to squeeze every last bit of performance out
> of
>   |the SSD drive he just installed.  I am not testing the environmental
> variables
>   |associated with index rebuilds.  FilePro support has not been very helpful
> on
>   |this matter as I don't think they have a good understanding how these
>   |variables work.
>   |
>   |I am testing the following values:
>   |@echo off
>   |title Rebuld Marketing Indexes
>   |SET PFMAXalloc=="256"
>   |SET PfMAXTEMP="1500"
>   |SET PFNUMIXBUILD=500
>   |dxmaint l_patient_market -ra -e
>   |
>   |By the way he is running Windows Server 2012 and Window 10 clients using
>   |SSD drives on the server. He is using external storage connected to his
>   |backbone using a 10 GB/S connection. FilePro is 5.8.03.27.
>   |
>   |As I am not sure if the 4.1 indexes sorting is multi key or if this is a
> waste as all
>   |of there indexes are multikey or have selection sets associated with the
> auto
>   |index.
>   |
>   |PFBIXBUILD=2
>   |
>   |
>   |
>   |Tells dxmaint to use 4.1 style sorting during build whenever possible. Use
> this
>   |on HUGE files to improve performance - on
>   |
>   |smaller files it will actually harm performance. (dxmaint)
>   |
>   |
>   |
>   |
>   |
>   |
>   |
>   |-------------- next part --------------
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>   |
>   |
>   |------------------------------
>   |
>   |Message: 3
>   |Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2020 14:15:00 -0500
>   |From: "Richard D. Williams" <richard at appgrp.net>
>   |To: filepro-list at lists.celestial.com
>   |Subject: Re: GetNext loops
>   |Message-ID: <4cf467d0-b217-5921-03c5-26aa246c6729 at appgrp.net>
>   |Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"; Format="flowed"
>   |
>   |You are not re-checking your key field match on each getnext instances.
>   |
>   |In order to control the looping lookup you must check the value of "ma"
>   |against the related field value in "tnts"
>   |
>   |i.e.
>   |
>   |  4  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |        ? If: '  for the purposes of this test, not requiring an exact
> match
>   |        Then: lookup tnts = rt17  k=ma i=0 -NG
>   |   5  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |loop   ? If: not tnts
>   |       Then: END
>   |   6  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -
>   |*If: tnts(3) ne ma****Then: END*
>   |
>   |
>   |That is the piece you are missing.
>   |
>   |Richard D. Williams
>   |
>   |
>   |On 9/22/2020 1:28 PM, Richard Veith via Filepro-list wrote:
>   |> In a lookup followed by a loop using GetNext, is there some limiting
> factor
>   |other than making sure all variables have a defined size, and that
> PFTOKSIZE
>   |is big enough?
>   |>
>   |> Here is our situation.  We use FilePro 5.7 on a Windows PC (Windows 7
>   |Professional, 64-bit OS, 16 GB ram), with no network involved.  Everything
>   |runs in a single machine.  We have a monthly process (executing from a
> batch
>   |file using DREPORT) that steps through some 19 million records, and for
> most
>   |of them does lookups to another FilePro database of nearly 30 million
>   |records, where the GetNext loop may find multiple, even hundreds,
>   |sometimes thousands, of relevant matches in the second DB.  Both files
>   |continually grow in size.  When we first ran into problems where the
> program
>   |would abort, after consulting this list, we made sure all the variables
> had
>   |defined sizes (which had not been true prior to that).  That solved our
>   |problem for a while.  Then as time went by, we ran into the problem again,
>   |and began increasing PFTOKSIZE (there is no automatic processing, and no
>   |CALLS or form processing in this program).  That worked up to a point, and
>   |then ceased to be effective.  For
>   | example, recently, the program would abort with a PFTOKSIZE of 200000 and
>   |about 298,400 records to go.  Increasing PFTOKSIZE to 250000 still
> resulted in
>   |an abort, but only about 270,000 records to go.  Increasing to 400000
> resulted
>   |in an abort with only about 86,000 records to go.  And further increases
> had
>   |no effect.  And there is nothing wrong with the records near the end of
> the
>   |file, because if we split the 19 million records in half so to speak
> (i.e., two
>   |selection sets), each half runs fine.
>   |>
>   |> To test the suspicion that it is related to the number of times GetNext
> is
>   |executed, we added a counter to the loop, and discovered that if, for any
>   |single record in the 19 million, we do no more than about 750 loops, the
>   |program would not abort.  But between that and 765 loops, it will still
> abort.
>   |>
>   |> To test this even more, I wrote a simple program that was devoid of all
> else
>   |except the GetNext looping, and it is included below.  The program is
>   |executed using DREPORT.  Whether PFTOKSIZE is 600000 or 800000, with the
>   |maximum number of loops set at 800, it always aborts with about 16,900,400
>   |records left to go out of about 19,500,000.  Assuming that on most records
> it
>   |really is doing 800 loops, it seems to do about 2 billion loops before
> dying.
>   |The Windows ?error? message simply says ?dreport.exe has stopped
>   |working.?
>   |>
>   |> Any suggestions?
>   |>
>   |>    1  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If: ' 2020-09-16  Test of excessive looping
>   |>         Then: ' -------------------------------------
>   |>    2  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If:
>   |>         Then: declare cnt(9,.0)  ' counter
>   |>    3  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If:
>   |>         Then: ma(20,*) = 7  'match string (w/ zip as a starting point)
>   |>    4  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If: '  for the purposes of this test, not requiring an exact
> match
>   |>         Then: lookup tnts = rt17  k=ma i=0 -NG
>   |>    5  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |> loop   ? If: not tnts
>   |>        Then: END
>   |>    6  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If:
>   |>         Then: cnt = cnt + "1"
>   |>    7  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If: cnt GT "800"
>   |>         Then: END
>   |>    8  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If:
>   |>         Then: getnext tnts; goto loop
>   |>    9  -------   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -   -
> -   -
>   |>         ? If:
>   |>         Then: END
>   |>
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>   |End of Filepro-list Digest, Vol 200, Issue 26
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