Context: Been running Tango since version 2 on the Mac. Only used FMP, mostly because it was the only thing that reliably worked on MacOS and was easy. (I know it was possible to connect to other database servers, but it was funky)
I am now on OS X server (10.2.5) and have latest releases of mysql, myodbc drivers, and witango installed.
In the case of migrating from FMP to MySQL (or some other rdbms), both need to be running on server. FMP requires user context rather than root process for witangod. This is VERY important for the diminishing class of people like myself who have apps in FMP who wish to keep them running while re-tooling for a real database.
I have legacy FMP databases running, and need to start up witango from terminal using:
/applications/witango/server/witangod -uo &
to force witango to operate in the user space rather than as a root process. That's required for FMP compatibility. FMP runs in user environment, as do it's apple events, so witango has to be there to work with it. That's what the smart people tell me.
So far, so good. FMP and witango do work. On OSX, it's actually pretty snappy. But FMP is a single threaded thing, people don't want it, it has limitations, it's popular to throw rocks at it, etc., so moving to something more robust is still an issue. I chose MySQL - the price was right - but I think the following applies to pretty much any other solution that requires ODBC connections
For FMP, you're running witango as a user space process, which is the hitch when concurrently trying to connect to MySQL....
[Jason Pamental gave good instructions about installing MySQL, MyODBC, etc., in a previous post]
You can install MySQL, the ODBC drivers, etc., and use YourSQL or SQL4X manager to define your databases, create users, etc. and now you want to create a taf that hits that MySQL database... The normal approach is to create a System DSN on the server and set that as the deployment datasource in your taf. It won't work...
As a user process, witango seems not to have access to system DSNs. This is where the errors come from that have had me stumped for the last week or more. Therefore the DSN on the server must be a user DSN.
You must use Apple's ODBC manager to create user DSN. OpenLink's won't create a user dsn on the server. Dunno why. Maybe because my logged in user is not admin (webstar)
On development machine running witango dev studio, there is a SYSTEM DSN that points to the server, enabling creation of tafs by accessing the live database. For that DSN, make sure the server=[ip address of deployment server]
Therefore, the general counsel of running a user DSN on dev machine and SYSTEM DSN on server is reversed. [This is the very important point]
There's more:
The system DSN on dev machine and user DSN on server need to be identical (names, values, except for server)
in specifying the datasource in a taf, it must be the option of "same". If I write in the attributes of the DSN on the server, it will not work.
I apologize that this note rambles. Jason guided me in deciphering these conditions and he's rolling this into his documentation. I think it's important, given the large installed base of Tango users on Mac, as it specifies the environment in which we can migrate from old Mac applications on FMP to unix based ones for OS X and get good use of the Xserves, etc. Tango, FMP, and Webstar were the magic combination for ease of use and rapid application development on MacOS. Now that we understand the rules for running witango/webstar/mysql while running the old applications, there is a path for Mac developers other than going to the dark side.
Roland
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