Re: PC's Locking up when in BPCS

Genyphyr,

In a message dated 2/23/00 11:22:23 AM Eastern Standard Time, novakg@ssax.com 
writes:

> The main issue we have at SSA, is that some customers get the 'hang' and the
>  lockup confused when calling in to HelpLine and frankly, since the causes
>  (and resolutions therefore) are different, we consider this to be fairly
>  important and not 'splitting hairs' !

My apologies.  I did not realize that you had two distinct problems here.  In 
my non-BPCS NT experience, the same programs have invariably failed under the 
same circumstances that they do under 3.x/95/98 -- they just hang instead of 
locking up.

>  Whether you have to get rid of duplicate records in a server file or apply 
a
>  server BMR to prevent a program from looping (causing a BPCS PC application
>  hang waiting for the server program) or apply the latest OPS Runtime 
Service
>  Pack because you are getting true lockups is a real issue for the end-user
>  and HelpLine. The OPS Runtime Service Pack is not going to resolve your
>  application looping issue, so that is why it is important to us that we 
know
>  the difference up front when analyzing the problem - we want to send you 
the
>  right fix! This is why we ask everyone to ask your end-users who are
>  complaining about a given PC 'hang' or 'freeze' problem to be as specific
>  and detailed as possible when calling the problem in to us.

Then my current client needs both!  We'll see how the OPS service pack works 
tomorrow.  Despite some BMR applications, they do still get the occasional 
duplicate record, though.

>  Your other notes about the superiority of NT's operating system are very
>  true, and it is true that our product is not the only one suffering this
>  fate (I personally switched to using an NT workstation at work, and I do 
not
>  use BPCS except to do testing here and there on fixes I write - I had my 
old
>  Windoze 95 box lock-up when running simple 'Microserf' office applications
>  and other non-BPCS applications, which forced me to re-boot sometimes
>  several times in one day - I am much happier on NT because I have seen the
>  'blue screen of death' about 1 time in the year I have had the box).

Amen!

>  All the same, we are committed to resolving this problem for the Win95
>  platform - it just is taking a long time to debug and fix due to the nature
>  of the problem and the lack of trails it leaves when it occurs.
>  
>  Here is a snippet of information from one of our runtime developers that
>  goes into the technical details of why the OS on NT is a better design than
>  WIN95 in general at handling programming errors, and what is happening
>  'under the covers' on NT when the true 'lockups' occur:
<<snip>>

One minor disagreement with this excellent distillation of the differences 
between OS's -- the AS/400 runs true 64 bit, not 32 like NT and most of its 
midrange competition :)!  NT also runs the same basic file system that OS/2 
does, thanks to the early development agreement where Micro$oft developed 
OS/2 for IBM.  Funny that Windows won the OS war, in part, because you had to 
"Shut Down" OS/2 instead of just turning off the computer and OS/2 required 
too much (4K) memory!

Regards!

Dean Asmussen
Enterprise Systems Consulting, Inc.
Fuquay-Varina, NC  USA
E-mail:  DAsmussen@aol.com

"I put instant coffee in the microwave and almost went back in time." -- 
Steven Wright
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