One of the first things I would recommend is to upgrade to Sesame 2.6.4. There was a lot of network changes/fixes between 2.5.3 and the latest version.

It almost sounds like something is going to sleep and closing ports but again I would upgrade to eliminate chasing an old issue that has already been fixed.

-Ray

Hi Ray,

I'm Haley's Comet circling back ...  I still have not upgraded from ver 2.5.3 (I've been trying to hold out for retirement and save my brain bruise).  But retirement still a ways off and some days the instability of this Sesame issue is a hair puller.

Yesterday I loaded a local Sesame client on the Sesame server, and the local client just disappeared in the middle of a task, forcing me to reload the client. 

So, this suggests to me that all of my problem may not be a Windows network issue, but rather either a programming issue in my Sesame, or possibly a file corruption issue in my database?

Thank you for your reply (and for still being here!).

I opened a local client that is located on the same computer that runs the Sesame server engine.

I will do as you suggest and upgrade.

ps - almost all of my heavy lifting programming with Sesame programming was 2009 - 2012.  I was able to automate so much of my daily tool set of tasks (sales, purchasing, inventory, shipping, invoicing) that I can still be competitive and profitable as a very small and very shorthanded business in 2022.   I could never have continued to be in business without Sesame.  So thank you.

Bingo.  The problems of instability (for 6-8 years) seems to have been an inadequate sized swap file on the WinXP server.  4096mb max physical memory, and the swap file was set at 2048mb.  Once I increased the swap file to max 4096mb, all errors and disconnects and read/write errors stopped.  Amazing.
IF I hadn't upgraded to 2.6.4, I would have never been able to view the granular details that showed just what the problem really was.  Once I could see all the disconnects happening behind the scenes, and then all the read/write errors happening to cause those disconnects (I guess due to not enough swap space allocated), it put 'hardware failure on my radar.  That got me looking at the workings of the server, and that let me come across the swap file and had me thinking "hold my beer and watch what happens when I increase swap file size to the max".
Fingers crossed, but so far so good!
I tried to post before and after pics, but pic pixel count too high.

Are the Laptops wireless or on the wired network? If wireless, does the problem persist if they are placed on a wired network?

-Ray

All the Network power saving settings have been turned off and sleep and hibernate are disabled correct? Strange that it's just the laptops.

Data other than the IP address appearing usually happens after a disconnect(or when something other than Sesame is trying to connect) and then garbage gets sent as part of the connection command.

-Ray

All of the fulltime workstations (desk and laptops) have all sleep and hibernation settings disabled.  My home and office laptop. works great on a fresh hookup, but once I disconnect to go home, then plug back in the next day, the router assigns the same ipaddress to my laptop as the previous day, and Sesame engine won't let it read/write well, building up read/write errors until they hit '100' when client connection vaporizes.   

So, the real beef by Sesame engine seems to be the ipaddress (not necessarily the laptop itself) - once a given ipaddress has been disconnected from Sesame, Sesame doesn't want to let it 100% back on the database.   

Is there a way to get the laptop to ask for a different ipaddress from the day before?  Or is there a way to tell Sesame 2.6.4 engine to clear its disconnect drawer and allow disconnected ipaddresses back on again?

Thanks Ray, I will try your suggestion.

lksseven wrote on Nov 4^th, 2022 at 6:29pm:


Those are Write/Ping errors to the Sesame client meaning that client is offline/unavailable/unresponsive/Ports were closed/or communications are so slow that they timed out.

-Ray

lksseven wrote on Nov 10^th, 2022 at 7:39pm:


If it only affects certain client systems, I would be looking at the client systems.

Quote:


When you say "Disconnected" do you mean the client is showing up in the Disconnected list of Sesame Server? I'm asking as Sesame clients closed normally do not show up there. It makes no difference to Sesame but could leave records locked.

As a test, here's a screenshot of the Server after a laptop client was disconnected from the network(turned off WIFI completely) so the Sesame Server disconnected it after 10 failed pings. Closed the Sesame Client, reconnected to Network(same IP) and then I restarted the Sesame client. At the time of the screenshot it had no issues in a little over 11 minutes. It's now been over 40 minutes and still no issues, failed Pings, or network errors.

-Ray

Looking at that picture, Your client has already been disconnected once and is failing pings again(which are on the 20,001 port, not the main 20,000 port). That Server also has something else trying to connect to it at 11:31 PM and 3:04 AM. Are you running an Internet Security program or other program that might be sniffing open ports on the Server?

-Ray

So, here's my workaround (I don't have a theory; this is just what appears to be working)...
- client computer logs on network and boots up sesame.
- work work work
- laptop is closed and taken home
- next day, laptop opened and logged on, and Sesame engine starts showing read write errors and then shortly thereafter kicks off the Sesame client, stating that 192.168.1.36 has been disconnected.  If I re load Sesame client (still with ip .36), Sesame engine starts showing read write errors (red strip) and again Sesame server engine kicks off the client.
------ 
But, if I go into laptop network adaptor and change the MAC address (spoof, in other words), then when the network adaptor reenables itself with the new MAC (just changed the last digit), it gets a new IP address from the router (192.168.1.38), and Sesame engine welcomes the new load of Sesame client with open arms.

If I repeat the laptop shutdown , reopen and reconnect, keeping the MAC so that the ip .38 stays the same, Sesame engine doesn't like it, read write (red strip) errors, and soon a kickoff of the client , stating not only line client 192.168.1.36 has been disconnected, but adding a second line that client 192.168.1.38 has also been disconnected.

If I change MAC address to '..c3', then get new ip of .39, and Sesame engine loves it.  IF I disconnect Sesame client, a repeat of the above, resulting with 3 disconnected lines .36, .38, .39 . 
But if I go back and change MAC back to original '..c1', router reassigns ip .36, and Sesame engine so far in an hour loves it - no red strip, no client kicked off. 

Does the Sesame server have a cache that gets rotated out, so third time's a charm and the original offending 'ip.36' gets dropped out of the cache, making Sesame engine then think a subsequent request from 'ip.36' is virginal ?

In any case, having to take 40 seconds to change MAC address upon opening laptop each day is far better than having to take 15 minutes shutdown/reload server sesame engine and reloading clients