Lookout 6 Hiccups

Sorry, this is a bit long winded....
I seem to have found the case of some of our hiccups with Lookout 6.0. We had been having problems with client workstations and extremely slow or now historical data trending on their clients. I had checked many things, including rebuilding the server and client processes, using ActiveX Trend vs. Lookout Trend and visa-versa, we used both an upgraded database and new database from scratch, etc.... I had spoken with support numerous times and they all had me trying different fixes.
NOTE:
Client Computers Discussed are Windows XP Professional SP2
Server Computer is a Windows 2003 Server Machine
One of our new client computers would not update historical trends at all, live data was fine, it would read that data and you could see it updating, but any historical trending would not work at all. I noticed that there is a new folder structure under the following (this will vary depending on your server computer's name and your server's database you are connecting to) "C:\Program Files\National Instruments\Shared\Citadel\_LocalCache\_monet_\_c__program_files_national_instruments_lookout_6_0_database_". I noticed that on machines that were trending historical data properly (or at least as properly as they could be, still slower then 5.0), there were files in this directory that seemed to be duplicating the database file structure on the server's machine, on the machine not trending, there were no files or just a log file (don't really remember). This raised my question about how the server and client communicate when using trends, I never got a straight answer from support, except to say that they talked to R&D and supposedly this folder has nothing to do with the historical trending on the client computer.
***HOWEVER***
During a recent non-related software upgrade, we found an issue with user rights assignments on Windows XP Professional workstations where for some reason, if a user was part of more then one group and they were a part of the "USERS" group, they would receive restricted access on the local computer even if they were a part of "POWER USERS" or "ADMINISTRATORS". We ended up having to make users part of the "POWER USERS" group only, to solve the unrelated problem. After doing this, the user with the non-functioning client noticed that the trends started updating on his computer.....and low and behold, there is now over 200MB of data in that cache folder, something tells me that the cache folder just might have something to do with the historical trending on 6.0 client computers. Hopefully at some point this post will either give someone some insight to a similar problem or at least any other database related issues they may be having with Lookout 6.0......or at least amuse someone.
If this all sounds a little sarcastic, it probably is....
Don't get me too wrong here, I do appreciate the new functionality provided with 6.0 and the new Citadel 5.0 database structure, but I think there are some serious inefficiencies in how the database functions and it seems like there is a major lack in documentation and knowledge on how it operates in the background.

fixthis,
I am unclear on what exactly you are seeing. "hypertrend chart updates, but the signals do not always appear." Do you mean the chart keeps scrolling, but the signals disappear? When you say "data window that pops up for the hypertrend does not update the data while moving the cursor across the hypertrend chart." I assume you are referring to the cursor data window -- what method are you using to move the cursor -- by clicking the arrows on the Hypertrend, by clicking on the cursor itself and moving it, by clicking the arrows in the Cursor data window, or by manually changing the time in the Cursor data window, either by using the arrows or typing a new time in?
Does this happen with both the Lookout Hypertrend and the NI ActiveX Hypertrend object? Does it happen when only one trace is on the Hypertrend or only with a larger number of traces?
We are very interested in knowing about Hypertrend/Citadel issues customers are experiencing, but unless we can reproduce the issue or have a very clear understanding of what is going on, it is very difficult to determine what the cause is or any possible fixes -- is it possible for you to post screen shots, and a very simple process file that will reproduce this problem?
Doug M
Applications Engineer
National Instruments
For those unfamiliar with NBC's The Office, my icon is NOT a picture of me

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Maybe Ryan and crew can clear this up....
All that is needed for the discreet object connection form a remote client to the server is an IP address of the server and firewall ports on the server to be properly opened. There are references online for the Firewall settings.
Hypertrend connections are a different animal and I would like NI to step in and explain this if possible:
What I have observed is that the traces must be using a commonly blocked (by ISP's) port. I have to use a VPN to get the traces to work from an internet client. I also must either be logged on to the domain of the server machine or map a local network drive to the server Citadel (Database) directory. The map only needs read permissions.
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Ed
Message Edited by erblock on 04-01-2008 09:29 AM

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Bye everyone,
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SVETLOST TEATAR

Hello,
It’s been a while since I last checked the forum, but in the meanwhile I’ve resolve the problem.
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Copyright National Instruments 1992-2004 All rights reserved.
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G

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