Server Startup and Control
AcuFieldView is designed to make it as easy as possible to use client-server mode in day-to-day operations.
There are a few key concepts to the architecture:
| Server Configuration files | These are simple text files that contain information that AcuFieldView needs to start a server, to set the working directory on the server and to provide explicit control over technical details such as timeouts. At least one configuration file must exist for each server. Multiple configuration files can be used for each server to make it convenient to set the working directory and other parameters on a project by project basis. The configuration files are read when AcuFieldView is started. |
| Communication via ports | The client process communicates to the server process over a mechanism known as ports, which are supported on Unix, Linux and Windows. AcuFieldView requires only one port per client process. It is important that the client and server are configured to communicate over the same port. Ports can be specified on the command line, or via environment variable. When the client and server are on physically separate machines, sockets are used to transport the data between client and server. When the client and server are on the same machine a more efficient method is used for data transport (local pipes). |
| Automatic server start | Once the server
configuration files are set up using automatic server start is
as simple as selecting a server (via a configuration file),
selecting the data type (Plot3D, and so on) and then using a
browser to pick the file to read. It is at this point that a
server process is started on the server machine. Whenever the
dataset is deleted (either by replacing it with another dataset
or exiting AcuFieldView) the server
is automatically stopped. You can use automatic server start when the account that you are logged into is also valid on the server machine. AcuFieldView uses a remote shell command (rsh, remsh, ssh, and so on) to log into the server machine and start the AcuFieldView server. |
| Manual server start | If AcuFieldView is run by default, it will automatically look at the .srv files in the sconfig directory for information about the server. If you instead need to start the server manually, you can use the manual server that is listed in the File/Data Input/Choose Server menu. When you choose this file, the Manual Start Command Window will pop up listing the server directory, IP address and port number. Before you click OK, the server must be running. To start the server, log on the server machine from the client and start the server executable, such as using the fvsrv command. Once the server is running, you can click OK and AcuFieldView will allow you to read in your data. |
| One server per dataset | In order to provide maximum flexibility and control, AcuFieldView uses one server process per dataset. Once process is used, whether the dataset is transient or steady state. Note that there is no preset limit to the number of servers that can be used simultaneously. |
| Timeouts | A timeout is an error that occurs when the client or server is waiting for an event to take place, and it does not occur within the allotted time. The length of the various timeouts can be set in the server configuration file. The ReadWrite-TimeOut default is zero. |