Increasing Your Automation Server's Capabilities in V4

The TeleMagic Automation Server is a highly versatile and powerful application. When set up correctly, it can send faxes, print documents, send and receive emails, and send wireless messages. Although the application is capable of handling an extremely large load of items, the limitations of trying to use a single server to do all your processing can really be a bottleneck in your business, especially when you are trying to send out that 5000 customer ad campaign. You only have a certain amount of processor time for each machine and you may also be limited in the time it takes you to send a single fax or email. Don't fret…there is an answer. There are several things you can do to accomplish heavy-load transmissions and processing.

First, you should make sure that you have a business edition operating system. Microsoft Windows NT (either workstation or server) is capable if handling this type of load. Microsoft Windows 95 and 98 are not designed for heavy-load operations such as this. Now, explaining how this all works will help illustrate how to speed it up. For argument's sake, let's look at sending a fax.

There are 2 stages to sending a fax: 1) merging the document, and 2) transmitting the fax. Before we can start optimizing the process, we must look at how the Automation Server (which from here on will be referred to as the AS) sends a fax. First, the document is opened and the data is merged from your database. Next, the default printer is set to your TeleMagic Fax driver and the document is printed to it. This creates a temp file. Finally, the temp file is sent to the fax modem to be transmitted. If you are only processing on one machine, these steps are done in sequence, one at a time. How can you speed this up?

Well, the first thought is to determine what stage in your process takes the longest. If your computer spends more time transmitting the fax than it does merging the document, you might want to add multiple modems. There are multi-port modem boards that allow you to put up to 8 modems on one computer. Some of these include the Digi PC8E board, the Rocketport 4 and 8 port boards, the RocketModem II 4 and 8 port boards, and the Chase Adapters 4 and 8 port boards. Remember this though, if you were to put more than 8 modems on one computer, you would probably be wasting modems. The AS will send a fax to the first modem on board, then as it goes to send the second, it will check for the next available modem. To make a long story short, depending on your document size, by the time it gets to the 5th or 6th modem the first one will be done and the AS will send the next fax to the first modem again. The transmission time of each fax will depend on the size of your documents, so if you have an elaborate document with lots of graphics, it may take more time. Increasing the number of modems is the most effective way to increase your transmission times. Faster modems like the 56k and the 128k shotgun modems will not help because those numbers refer to data transmission and not fax transmission. The standard for transmitting fax data is still only 14.4k. But what if your bottleneck is not in the transmission phase, or your fax modems are idle waiting for the merge process to finish? That is where multiple servers come in.

You can configure multiple servers to be run from different workstations to distribute the load. This is done in the Setup section of the AS. Each server is assigned a unique ID. By default FX1 is installed as a merge and transmit server. Remember we are trying to split up the processes. That's why each server ID can be configured to tackle a particular process. Let's say that we wanted to set up 2 servers, one to merge only and one to fax only. In the Setup dialog box of the AS, highlight the FX1 server ID and click Edit. Under the General Settings tab, find the radio button for Transmit Only and select it. Save those settings. Next, click the Add button. Give the new server a unique ID. Let's use MG1. This server will do nothing but merge documents, so it is not necessary to configure the local area code, etc. or the fax specific settings. You will have to configure your word processor for it though. It must also have the same working directory as your transmit server. There is a reason for this. Remember that temp file you read about earlier? The working directory is where it is created. The transmit server will check the working directory for these temp files and send them. If you have different working directories, your merge server will say that everything has been merged and your transmit server will be idle. Save these settings for MG1. Now, you have your 8 port fax board on a transmit-only server and you have another server ID doing nothing but merging documents and preparing them to be transmitted. All you need to do to use it is to launch the AS on each computer, select the appropriate server ID and process.

The same principles apply for mass emails. Since TeleMagic Internet Mail has the capability to merge attached documents with data from your database, this is another prime application for splitting up this process. Of course, your transmit limitations are not defined be the number of modems or phone lines, but by the bandwidth of your Internet connection. If your bottleneck is in the transmission phase of your email process, you may consider contacting your Internet service provider for a faster connection. For further instruction on how to set up your server to process email like this, consult your help file or contact TeleMagic Technical Support.

You have seen how to create just one additional server. The possibilities are limitless. You can have any number of transmit servers using multi-port modem boards or high-speed Internet connections and an equal number of merge servers processing documents to be sent. So what are you waiting for? Set the gears in motion!

 

-- End of FAQ #552

FAQ ID #552

Product Related: TeleMagic 4.x

Last Updated:
March 20, 2000