Recently one of my customers was having problem where the ODBC connection
between D3/Linux and Worldship would drop (some kind of a network time out
issue). When this happened, the port would hang. They would then stop and
restart the import, causing another port to fire up and consuming another
license. Through out the day, the number of licenses consumed became a
problem.

We installed Accuterm on the workstation, turned on the send keep alives
feature, and launched a session. The keep alives seems to prevent the
connection from dropping and has solved the problem so far. The procedure
now is to start Accuterm first, then Worldship.

Has anyone else experienced this situation?

Jeff

Well, using Accuterm to keep the connection alive did not work either. My
customer is running me ragged. Is this a Worldship problem, network problem,
Windows problem? Who knows? Any insight is appreciated.

Jeff


"Jeffrey Kaufman" <jkaufman (AT) keydata (DOT) us> wrote

Start the ODBC service in a "foreground" window with the -DPV options. It
will display what's happening as it happens. When the connection dies,
there should be some kind of indications as to why.

Mark Brown


"Jeffrey Kaufman" <jkaufman (AT) keydata (DOT) us> wrote

I'll try that. Thanks.

"Mark Brown" <mbrown (AT) drexelmgt (DOT) com> wrote

"Jeffrey Kaufman" <jkaufman (AT) keydata (DOT) us> wrote

Hmm.. We used WorldShip and never had that problem. Which D3
release/patch-level are you running? I wrote an XML shipping system for UPS
and FedEx, so WorldShip isn't being used that much any more.

What kind of equipment are you using on the network?

Glen

Not that this is any help to your problem, but quite a few years ago, I
wrote an interface to a third party shipping system where I wrote .csv
files out to a Samba share that the application picked up, and then
wrote out another file that I was waiting for the get the shipping
information from to complete the invoice posting. At some point, the
decision was made to switch to Worldship, and I worked with a UPS
programmer who modified the software to use the same methodology. It
has worked great over the years, which at this point is coming close to
500,000 shipments. We also just put the same system in place at
another location and it also is working great.

I'm just pointing out that ODBC isn't the only answer, which I see as a
plus given the problematic tendancies of the ODBC driver.

Glen,

This is a brand new D3/Linux server with the latest D3 and Red Hat
Enterprise. We upgraded the server from AP/Pro, switched from Faxlink to
Active Fax, and set up the ODBC interface to Worldship all at the same time.
Reading the AP/Pro tapes was a hassle. Other than that, the conversion went
smooth as silk. Then this problem cropped up.

On Friday I told the customer that this is either a network problem, Window
problem, PC problem, or Worldship problem, and that I can no longer commit
anymore time to it. Jeez, it is working fine in a dozen other sites. I can
only do so much. So they have an IT network guy coming in tomorrow.

Thanks for your help.
Jeff


"Glen B" <dfdfg (AT) dfkjdfg (DOT) com> wrote