FH Response Times

FH response times are determined by the speed and memory of a workstation, and the configuration of the FH system.

Example: If FH data is stored on a network, slow response times could be caused by your connection to the network.

Note: The standard version of FH is not optimized to run over a wide-area network; for best results we recommend using FH Enterprise.

Information about FH Enterprise is available in About FH Enterprise.

Below are several options to improve speed.

Database audit tracking allows a detailed account of record and/or field changes to be maintained. This is a complicated procedure that results in large amounts of data to be written to an audit table. Over a network connection, the time to access this table can result in slow responses. If you do not need to audit field or record changes, you can disable audit tracking.

  1. From the Administration menu, select Administrative Options .

    The Administrative Options form is displayed.

  2. Select the Database tab.

    The Database section is displayed.

  3. Remove the check mark from Enable Database Audit Tracking to disable database audit.

If database audit tracking is enabled, the table that tracks the changes could have become quite large. Purging this table can improve FH response times.

  1. From the Administration menu, select Database Audit Log.

    The Database Audit Log form is displayed.

  2. Select the Data tab.

    The Data section is displayed.

  3. Press Options then select Purge Audit Log.

    The Enter a Value form is displayed.

  4. Type the cut off date for purging dates, then press OK.

    All audit records from the date you entered and earlier are removed from the system.

In standard FH on a network install that stores data on a network, there are certain directories that you can copy to local workstations. This can help response times by minimizing network traffic and minimizing the amount of data that FH reads from and writes to the network.

Which directories you can copy will vary based on your department's operating procedures.

Directory Does this

Database

This directory should be shared on a network unless you use automated tasks to export/import records between stations.

Information an automated tasks is available in Add Automated Tasks.

System

The System directory should be shared on a network. Enable local caching if you encounter slow response times due to network response times.

Lookup

When empty, lookup tables are stored in Database. The Lookup directory should be shared on a network. Enable local caching if you encounter slow response times when displaying lookups due to network response times.

Queries

Warning: This directory should not be copied from the local network to the local workstation.

Reports

Warning: This directory should not be copied from the local network to the local workstation.

Help

Warning: This directory should not be copied from the local network to the local workstation.
  • Check Enable local caching of system and lookup tables and specify a local directory to automatically copy network System and lookup tables (either in Database or, if specified, Lookup).

If you use automated tasks, consider increasing all Timed intervals.

Example: If you are running an import every 1 minute, consider increasing this interval to a higher value (if possible).

Information an automated tasks is available in Add Automated Tasks.

From a performance standpoint, the edit toolbar is the most resource intensive desktop element in all of FH, because when it is displayed, there is a timer firing in the background every .8 seconds and every time it fires, the edit toolbar buttons are refreshed based on status of the system. This is why the buttons enable/disable dynamically like they should. If you're running a low-end machine, you will see a small but noticeable performance hit. This is also a potential Citrix/PCanywhere, etc... issue because a lot of refreshing is happening with the toolbar displayed.

Also, if you create any "custom" toolbar and drop a button from the edit category onto it, a timer is instantiated for that toolbar also.

Note: In the registry under FIREHOUSE Software\Workstation there is a string named Toolbar with a value of 800. This is the value in milliseconds that we use to set the edit toolbar (or any toolbar that has "edit" buttons) timer refresh interval. You can slow down the timer fire by increasing this value. 800 is the value we felt provided the best trade-off between reasonable refresh and minimal performance degradation.

Warning: Make sure you have an experienced computer engineer available when making changes to the registry.