Administrator’s Guide (Windows)

1-2 FileMaker Pro Server Administrator’s Guide
How does FileMaker Pro Server work?
FileMaker Pro Server for Windows NT consists of a service and a
control panel. By operating as a service, FileMaker Pro Server provides
improved performance to FileMaker Pro guests on the network. Like
other Windows NT services, it does not require a user to be logged in to
the computer running the service, which provides better security.
FileMaker Pro Server is a tool to use with FileMaker Pro 3.0 in a
network environment to:
1 enhance the guests’ performance
1 increase the number of FileMaker Pro guests who can connect to a
file hosted by FileMaker Pro Server
1 increase the number of files that can be hosted by FileMaker Pro Server
1 host files using more than one network protocol simultaneously
FileMaker Pro Server acts only as a dedicated host to the FileMaker Pro
files; you can’t see or modify data in these files with FileMaker Pro
Server. See “Configuring the FileMaker Pro Server control panel” on
page 2-1 for more information.
Using the FileMaker Pro application to remotely administer
FileMaker Pro Server, you can:
1 open—or host —a FileMaker Pro database file, making it available to
FileMaker Pro guests on the network
1 view information about the files being hosted, such as the number of
users accessing each database
1 send messages to connected users
1 close a hosted FileMaker Pro file, making it unavailable to
FileMaker Pro guests
1 disconnect a selected FileMaker Pro guest from a particular hosted
file or all hosted files
See chapter 3 for more information on administering FileMaker Pro Server.
When you start the FileMaker Pro Server service, it automatically opens
and hosts all multiuser FileMaker Pro files located in the same folder as
the service (and subfolders one level down), up to a maximum of 100
files. This lets you easily set up the database files that you always want
FileMaker Pro Server to host on the network.