Basic Networking For Using Collect!

This document tells you what to do after you have installed Collect! to your Server and you want to enable your workstations to access it. We will cover two areas of setup - what you need to do at your Server and what you need to do at each Workstation.

Before proceeding:

• You must have successfully installed Collect! on your Server. Please refer to Install Collect! For The First Time for complete installation instructions. Make sure you complete all the steps, including the section entitled "Server Startup." This will automatically give the CV11 Server your Server's IP Address.
• You should not have any additional installations of Collect! on your workstations.

At The Server

The following steps need to be performed at your Server.

1. Double-click the CV11 icon to open the Collect! program.

2. Accept the default ID and Password, OWN and own to sign into Collect!. The Welcome To Collect! screen is displayed and the CV11 Server will be started and minimized in your Windows taskbar.

3. Select the radio button labeled Shared to set your Database access mode. This allows multiple users to sign into the database.

4. Select the SELECT DATABASE button and select Masterdb database. You may need to use your UP arrow to see all the options. Select OK and ensure that the field labeled Database to Open displays the word MASTERDB. This is your working database.

5. Select the button labeled Start to sign into Collect! This will ensure that you are able to access your database.

6. Quit Collect! all the way back to your Desktop. Leave the CV11 Server (rds.exe) running on your server so that you can test the shortcut we are going to create on your workstation Desktop.

7. On your server, create a share for the folder containing Collect!. This will permit workstations to find the shared Collect! program. The share should have read/write access for all users of Collect!

At The Workstation

The following steps are performed at each workstation that needs to access Collect!.

1. Each workstation needs a shortcut pointing to the shared Collect! program on your server.

The shortcut typically contains a target like this:

\\server01\CV11\bin\CV11.exe

2. To create a shortcut use My Network Places or Network Neighborhood on your Desktop.

3. Search in Entire Network for your server and find the CV11 folder you shared when setting up your server.

4. In the CV11\bin folder double-click the CV11.exe file to run Collect!

5. If Collect! runs successfully in the step above, highlight the CV11.exe entry you used and Right click it. A context menu will appear.

6. From the context menu, choose Send To - Desktop (create shortcut) to send the shortcut to your workstation's Desktop. This shortcut is all that Collect! needs to have installed on a workstation.

7. Leave the workstation signed in and go to the server. Sign into Collect! on the server. If you can do this while still signed in at your workstation, you have successfully created a multi-user installation of Collect!.

8. Repeat Steps 2 - 6 for each workstation.

CV11 Not Responding To Requests

The CV11 Server runs in a console. On Windows 2000, the console process will be suspended if the user clicks into it. This will effectively prevent the server from responding to requests from CV11 clients.

You can easily tell that someone has clicked into the console window. In the blue title bar, you will see the word "Select." Press the ESC key on your keyboard and "Select" should disappear. Your CV11 Server is now active again.

To prevent this from occurring again, you need to Right click the RDS console caption bar, select properties and uncheck the QuickEdit mode and Insert Mode options. Click OK, and then select Save properties for future windows with same title. Now whenever the server starts, the user will not be able to click into it.

This same method also applies to any console window.

Troubleshooting

Please refer to How To Troubleshoot A Slow Network for a list of areas to troubleshoot and many helpful tips to keep your network running smoothly and efficiently.

See Also

- Introduction To Multi User Network Setup
- How To Troubleshoot A Slow Network
- Install Collect! For The First Time
- Installation Topics