The ComsData location is
stored in the Windows Registry of each workstation and this is controlled
by the Windows operating system - and not the application. This is
required in order for a program to be considered 'Windows 2000/XP Logo
compliant.' In other words, this is the way that Windows expects to find
path locations. The way this all works is this: using Windows Explorer (or
any other network tool) you will 'move' the ComsData folder to anywhere
you wish. Then, the next time you start a workstation - that workstation
will get a re-install dialog that simply allows the user to re-select the
new location of the ComsData folder. If the user does not select a
ComsData folder that does contains certain required files, he will not be
allowed to proceed - he can only correct this condition or exit the
application. I would suggest if the administrator moves the ComsData
folder that he be the one that notifies the user of this change, or
perhaps even re-starts each of these workstations himself. Either way, it
will be difficult for a user to select an incorrect folder - unless you
have multiple copies of ComsData setting around on computers (which is not
a good idea anyway).
The current version of the COMS ships using a VFP 7-8-9 file table
structure. Code is already in place for a future upgrade to also use SQL
2000-2003, etc.
Just 'move' the ComsData folder to the new location (you can do
this with Windows Explorer - but do NOT put this folder in the ComsWin
folder!!!). Then, the next time you start the COMS v.8.x it will ask you for that new
location.
First of all, make sure you exit the COMS program if it is running.
Although you can select Open instead of Save when you
click on the Setup.exe file to download, we recommend you do the following
instead.
Download the Setup.exe to your Desktop and run the Setup.exe form
there by double-clicking on it. It will over-write necessary information, but not your data.
After the Setup.exe has been run, you can right-click on it and delete it
- or just leave it on your Desktop (if you leave the Setup.exe on your
Desktop please remember you will be replacing it the next time you
download another Setup.exe update - which is OK).
If you have a multi license from us - remember you need to run the
Setup.exe on each workstation (or computer) . Also, do not EVER save the
Setup.exe to the ComsWin folder.
Maybe, as the update here is always the latest version. However, you
can check the version that you installed at anytime by pulling down
Help... and selecting About. If the version number is the same there as
the update here, there is no reason to download and install the update.
Yes, you may and you should use the old COMS 5.x till you are familiar and comfortable with the new COMS - there is no time limit. Also, I would download the updates whenever they are posted here in this support forum as they usually contain enhancements which made the software easier to use.
You don't 'restore' old v.5.5 data into the new COMS version 8.x, but rather 'convert' it. The old data needs to be in a folder that the new COMS v.8.x can find (normally off a root HD folder) for this to happen. If you do NOT have your old v.5.5 data on the new computer, you need to email Specialty Software with a subject line of your serial# and in the body of the email with a note that you need to move old files to a new computer so you can convert them. Fortunately, the new program would not allow you to restore those old v.5.5 files, or it would have corrupted your new data.
Although this section was initially written to deal with LAN issues,
items 1 & 2 also apply to a regular single stand alone computer that is
not connected to a LAN. If you are happy with the performance of
your computer and the way it is accessing data, then you can just ignore
this section. Most single stand along computer users can just ignore this
section.
Slow computer data access makes your forms open slower, and also can
dramatically effect they way the Search Forms "search" for your data
(example: when you type in SMITH you want it to quickly go to the first
Smith). Following the steps outlined in this section can dramatically help
in this. If you are on a LAN, you will might have to bring in a
professional LAN person, as most churches do not have a qualified person
on staff.
Accessing data over a LAN can be 4 to 5 times slower than accessing
data from a local hard drive (because the data has to be moved across your
LAN wire) - but you don't normally notice this as its so fast anyway. However, there are some things that help your LAN perform much
faster and more efficient. We realize this can be a real problem in a
local church situation as most churches do not have a knowledgeable System
Administrator on staff. Hopefully the following suggestions can help you
setup your LAN correctly, or at least direct the professional network
person who you bring in to assist you:
- Big Issue! Are you using Virus Software - in
particular Norton's? If you always
have it set for "auto protect" on, this can slow down a networked
situation by 2 to 3 times but now days Virus protection it is pretty
much always required. Within Norton's, make sure you exclude the following
extensions in the ComsData folder: .DBC, .DBT, .DBX, .DBF, .FPT, and .CDX.
In our in house test with Norton's, we found having it turned on to auto
protect slowed down data access by 1,000% (ten fold!) - so excluding
these files was the solution. For detailed information on how to
exclude these extensions,
click on this link from Microsoft (notice this link talks about Visual FoxPro applications which
the COMS program is. Also, do not follow the directions given in the
link for Method 3 - or you will not be able to update your actual
software. And, remember the main files you are excluding are in the
ComsData folder whereas this link's example used a folder of K:\Data).
Important! If you are not familiar with Norton's you might need your LAN
professional or system administrator to help you do this for you.
- If you are always online, your Email client might also be checking
for new mail in the background. You might consider turning this feature
off. We have not verified this as a real problem in house because we do
not use email this way. However, we know it can be in certain
situations.
- Important Issue! Replace old 10 mbps Network Ethernet cards with newer
100 mbps ones. Also, with 10
machines using a full-duplex switch, at 100 Mbps might give you up to
200 times the performance of a 10 Mbps hub (assuming that all machines
try to access the network at the same time). If you don't know what
this all means, have your professional network person do this for you.
- Maybe an Issue! Some, but not all user's have had
success with what is mentioned in this paragraph. Add the following Protocols to
each workstation and server: For Windows XP make sure Nwlink is
added. For Windows 2000, Windows Millennium, and Windows 98 make sure
Netbeui is added. One way to verify this on a Windows XP and Windows
2000 computer is open up "Network and Dial-up Connections,' right click
on the 'Local Area Connections' and select 'Properties.' If you don't
see this file in the list, press 'Install' and then highlight 'Protocol'
in the dialog that appeared. Once 'Protocol' is highlighted, press 'Add'
and then select the Nwlink file if you are using Windows XP, or
Netbeui for Windows 2000, Windows Millennium, and Windows 98. If
you are using Windows Millennium or 98, the procedure will be somewhat
similar (sorry - we no longer have this old type computers in use).
- This issue "might" speed up your LAN if you need to get every last
ounce of performance out of it. On a peer-to-peer network where one
computer is designated as the "server" you should take steps to ensure
that computer is always the "master browser." This is a somewhat
complicated procedure and you should bring in your professional LAN
person to check this for you.
Attention professional LAN person, click this to read up what you might
need to do. Also, this
link
might also help you do this on a Windows 2000/XP machines.
- Major Big Issue! Install the COMS on each workstation!
The default installation does do this, but we had a few users who were
creative in this and installed the application on their server - and
they were wrong in doing this! The only thing installed on the
server is the ComsData folder, and perhaps the Visuals and MyReport
folder - all this is explained in the COMS Must ReadMe! file found on
your desktop. If your server is also a workstation, obviously you will
then install the application on it as well.
The following is put together just as a guideline. We adapted this list
from a friend who recently passed away.
Obviously you might not be able to implement all these features at
once, but as you replace comportments this list should help
and will cut down on you spending additional consulting money with a
professional LAN person in the future.
Present this short list to your professional LAN person when/if you
bring him in for help in setting up your server.
If you are setting up a network using existing computers, try not to
mix Win98 in your network. Try to put those old Windows 98 and
Windows Millennium systems out to pasture as soon as you can. Absolutely
no Win95 under any conditions; the risks of a Win95 box acquiring the
status of browse master for the peer-to-peer network is nasty. You
certainly want the primary station hosting the data to be running Win2K of
some flavor or XP Pro, and do it on an NTFS volume; with light app loading
and a reliable disk system and a few registry hacks, and UPS's (battery
backups) on each and every PC and network hub/router.
If you are buying all new computers, buy fast ones with 512k RAM, and
Windows 2000 Professional or Windows XP Pro. Windows 2000/2003 Server are
OK as well.
Use solid NIC's (network Ethernet cards)- you don't need to spend a lot -
NetGear, Intel and a
number of other vendors sell 10/100 NIC's for under $30 each. You want a
name brand model with a solid history. We have heard from many that the
new Gigabit Ethernet are great, and substantially faster (this is what we
will be buying ourselves from now own).
Several generations of backup:
- Daily backup Monday through Thursday - each on different media (in a
new week, you can re-use the prior Monday - Thursday media if you wish).
- Friday backup on different media and save this for all Fridays in
the Month (in a new month, you can re-use the Friday media if you wish,
although some keep each week archived to CD or Tape or Diskette).
- Monthly Backup saved on different media throughout the year.
- Yearly backups.
Keep all the original CDs for the software locked in a desk somewhere, and
if someone 'borrows' a CD to install the software, they check it out, like
a library card.
Well, put it this way: we haven't
even thought of turning a computer on in our offices in over fifteen years
unless they were plugged into a UPS. A UPS is the best protection
you can buy for your computer, and they cost around a hundred dollars. We
only buy the ones made by APC and use them exclusively, as we have had
trouble with the Tripp Lite ones. We work right through Florida
thunderstorms without ever having a problem.
Also, I suspect the lady who just lost 8 months worth of data without a
backup would probably tell you the same thing - especially as easy as
making a backup of your data is.
Make sure you have done all the suggestions mentioned in the above FAQ
titled What can I do to speed up the access of data on my
LAN or
on my single stand alone computer?,
because if your LAN is slow is has nothing to do with the COMS for Windows
software but is because of the way your LAN is setup.
However, we realize most churches do not have a professional LAN person
on staff or even available. Because of this, we have included a special
option which allows you to use a special Family Form and Giving Form
People Lookup that will work fast even on a slow LAN (is does this by
putting a small lookup copy of the People's names on your local hard drive
in its temporary folder).
If your LAN is not slow, please do not do this. However, if you need to
take advantage of this option, do the following on each workstation:
1-In the COMS program, pull down the Tools menu, and select Properties.
Put a check in the section titled Lookup Form (in other words, check the
line that says "Check only if the People Lookup List seems very slow."
Then press OK to save this.
2-In the Family & People Form or in the Enter Giving Form, press the
key combination of Alt+L to use this new form.
3-If you add new People into the People Form, they will NOT appear in
this special lookup list until you press the Requery button on the Family
& People Form, and also in the Enter Giving Form. The Requery button is
the little push button that has binoculars as its icon. When you press the
Requery button, it will rebuild this special list for you, and remove
People who have been deleted or added. You can press this button as often
as you wish. Pressing the Requery button means this table never needs to
be Re-indexed or Packed.
However, if this table ever gets damaged due to a hard drive issue,
power outage, etc., you might have difficulty opening the Family & People
Form, and also the Enter Giving Form. This can be easily corrected. Pull
down the Tools menu and select Maintenance Procedures. Once the
Maintenance Procedures Form is open, press the Re-initialize tab, and you
will then be able to Re-build this lookup table.
Yes you can. Pull down Tools... Properties..... Web Settings.
From this site you can turn off the online background screen that is
pulled from our web site. Select Never to make the background of the COMS
program appear blank.
Please note that if you deactivate the web features of the COMS You
will also disable special enhancements which are being made to the
software that are only available to those who have a consistent connection
to the web. Some of these enhancements include a quick click to go to this
Club web site for help with technical issues and downloads. We also use
this feature to post information about updates/upgrades, and to also post
critical items such as security items that might be floating around in
cyber land.
In the computer that currently has your Data, start the COMS program.
Pull down the Tools menu and select the Maintenance option. Then select
the Backup option and backup ALL COMS for Windows data to a media
of your choice that you can take to the new computer. Notice you can
backup to an A drive, B drive, or even to a stick or USB drive. Most
computers do NOT allow you to directly save the file to a CD, but you
could save the file to your desktop then using your CD burning software
you could burn that file to your CD. The name of the backup file is
usually titled OurData by default.
On the new computer, install the COMS program from either the CD, or
the two downloads available on this forum. Once installed, start the COMS
program and pull down the Tools menu and select the Maintenance
option. Then select the Backup option and then Restore ALL COMS for
Windows data from the file (OurData) or media you brought from the other
computer where you made the backup from.
Vista is quickly being replaced by Windows 7, which should be a much
better OS system from Microsoft. It could be many years before Windows 8
replaces Windows 7 (although Microsoft will mostly likely release a major
upgrade to Windows 8 by the end of year 2013 to make it look and act more
like Windows 7).
Windows 7, Windows 8, and Vista kind of want to control your computer in many
ways. Sometimes you can't even find a file or folder you created as they
have been virtualized into another place. An example of this is the
data folder that the COMS for Windows program uses: it is titled
C:\ComsData and notice it is located off
the root directory of drive C:\ (this is just an example, it would be in a
different directory on a network). We place this folder here so that you
(the end user) know where all your important data is, and also in case you
should ever need to call a tech person at our company for additional help.
On some Vista or Windows 7 and Windows 8 computers (notice some but not all), you
might see this folder off the C:\ drive, but in reality Vista or Windows 7
or 8 has made a duplicate copy somewhere and you might not be aware of its
location. You can see what the issue is here, as most churches do not have
professional computer support staff. As a fact, most just use volunteer
help or the Pastor or secretary is the only computer person. In this
situation, all prior versions of Windows were far easier to use because of
the hidden files and folders. Much of this is controlled by what is called
a UAC setting (this stands for User Account Control).
However, there is a way to make both Windows 7, Windows 8, and Vista act more like
Windows XP in this situation, and that is turning the UAC setting off.
A handful of churches have been required to turn off the UAC in order
for the COMS for Windows (as well as many many other programs) to run correctly. This is one of the issues that
makes Vista in particular so difficult at times for many people (why do
only some computers require this and others do not). We at Specialty
Software always turn off the UAC as we have many other programs that did
require it to be turned off before they would install.
Windows 7, Windows 8, and Vista allow you to turn off the UAC which then allows our
software and other software to create its own file paths like prior
version of Windows. Turning off the UAC is what is explained below.
However, the choice as to turn it off is up to you. We have found our
computers much more responsive without as many annoying questions with the
UAC turned off. The following section explains how to turn off the
UAC for Windows 7 and Windows 8, and there is also an additional section
below for Vista.
1- Attention Windows 7 and Windows 8 users: to turn off the UAC, type UAC in the search box and then press the little
magnifying glass (see step 2 for help in locating your search box).
2a- for Windows 7 the search box is found right above the
Start button.
2b- for Windows 8, the search box is found in a number of
places depending on how your Windows 8 computer is setup - so you will
have to look for the search box. As a Window 8 user, you are looking for
the Settings search box!!!! This is NOT obvious. You will
have to look for it. You might have to select the option Settings
before you type in the search box or you will not find what is needed as
explained in step 3.
3- one of the first items returned by the search will be a selection
titled something like Change User Account Control settings.
Click on this selection and a dialog will appear titled something like
User Account Control Settings.
4- scroll the slider on the left all the way down to the bottom so that
Never Notify is selected.
5- press the OK button, and your computer will require a restart.
6-turning off the UAC will allow you to have more control over your
folders and their placement so you will know where your data is actually
located (more similar to the way Windows XP was designed).
7. Windows 8 special note: Microsoft is being forced by the
market place to modify Windows 8 to have more of a look of Windows 7 and
they have announced there will be a Windows 8.1 which we believe will
bring back the Windows Start button that every version of Windows has had
since 1995. At that point, we expect you to be able to Turn off the UAC
just like as explained in the Windows 7 instructions above. We expect
Windows 8.1 to be released by the end of year 2013.
8- This is the end of special instructions for Windows 7 and
Windows 8 Users.
1- Attention Vista users: to turn off the UAC, press the Start button and select
Control Panel.
2- type UAC in the search box and then press the little
magnifying glass.
3- one of the first items returned by the search will be User
Accounts – Turn User Account Control (UAC) on
or off.
4- click on Turn User Account
Control (UAC) on or off.
5- uncheck the Use User Account
Control (UAC) to help protect your computer.
6- press the OK button, and your computer will require a restart.
7- if you don't know how to find and open your control panel, you could
also click on your Desktop and press the F1 function key. Help will
appear, and you can type turn off UAC in the help search box, and
press the enter key. At that point, you can find in the list how to turn
off the UAC and more information about it.
8- This is the end of special instructions for Vista Users.
