Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.  It
was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP and
it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect, load
a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same process
takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.

A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets us
back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we have
800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.

I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding response
time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other than
more RAM, for speeding things up?

TIA,
Jim

40s seems a high but you are working with an increasingly resource intensive
version of Word. What is load time of the same template and document from
WordXP on those machines? In reading
http://www.microsoft.com/office/evaluation/sysreqs.asp compared to
http://www.microsoft.com/office/previous/ofc95brch/specs.asp, the
requirements are significantly different and far more OS dependent. Based on
these requirements docs, your machines appear to be somewhat underpowered
for WordXP.
--

Chris Keating
Sybase Adaptive Server Anywhere Professional Version 8

Sybase TechWave User Training and Solutions conference -- August 4 - 8, 2003
in Orlando, FL.   -- A great place for education and  in-depth discussions
on all our technology, future trends in the market, not to mention getting
time with the engineers who create the products!  For more information,
visit http://www.ianywhere.com/techwave2003

iAnywhere Solutions  http://www.iAnywhere.com

** Please only post to the newsgroup

** Whitepapers can be found at http://www.iAnywhere.com/developer
** EBFs can be found at http://downloads.sybase.com/swx/sdmain.stm
** Use CaseXpress to report bugs http://casexpress.sybase.com

"Jim G" <jim.gillett@dcyf.ri.gov> wrote in message
news:3f3a558d$1@forums-1-dub...
> Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.
It
> was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP
and
> it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect,
load
> a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same process
> takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.
>
> A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets us
> back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we have
> 800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.
>
> I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding
response
> time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other
than
> more RAM, for speeding things up?
>
> TIA,
> Jim
>
>

Outside of the app, starting Word XP, loading the template and opening the
doc takes about 13 seconds.   We meet the "minimum" requirements for Office
XP but not the "recommended".

"Chris Keating (iAnywhere Solutions)" <FightSpam_keating@iAnywhere.com>
wrote in message news:3f3a6ac8$1@forums-1-dub...
> 40s seems a high but you are working with an increasingly resource
intensive
> version of Word. What is load time of the same template and document from
> WordXP on those machines? In reading
> http://www.microsoft.com/office/evaluation/sysreqs.asp compared to
> http://www.microsoft.com/office/previous/ofc95brch/specs.asp, the
> requirements are significantly different and far more OS dependent. Based
on
> these requirements docs, your machines appear to be somewhat underpowered
> for WordXP.
> --
>
> Chris Keating
> Sybase Adaptive Server Anywhere Professional Version 8
>
> Sybase TechWave User Training and Solutions conference -- August 4 - 8,
2003
> in Orlando, FL.   -- A great place for education and  in-depth discussions
> on all our technology, future trends in the market, not to mention getting
> time with the engineers who create the products!  For more information,
> visit http://www.ianywhere.com/techwave2003
>
> iAnywhere Solutions  http://www.iAnywhere.com
>
> ** Please only post to the newsgroup
>
> ** Whitepapers can be found at http://www.iAnywhere.com/developer
> ** EBFs can be found at http://downloads.sybase.com/swx/sdmain.stm
> ** Use CaseXpress to report bugs http://casexpress.sybase.com
>
> "Jim G" <jim.gillett@dcyf.ri.gov> wrote in message
> news:3f3a558d$1@forums-1-dub...
> > Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.
> It
> > was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP
> and
> > it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect,
> load
> > a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same
process
> > takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.
> >
> > A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets
us
> > back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we
have
> > 800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.
> >
> > I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding
> response
> > time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other
> than
> > more RAM, for speeding things up?
> >
> > TIA,
> > Jim
> >
> >
>
>

Jim I had a similar problem, and we went from 128 mb of RAM to 256 mb, but
it was still to slow (due to XP's resource intensive app's)...

In order to improve performance I had to change my way of thinking:

Instead of populating the templates through OLE I created a master list of
templates loaded with merge fields.  I then used FileExists, FileDelete,
FileOpen, FileWrite to create a Merge file.

I used OLE to create a new document, and inserted the various templates
requested by the user (located on the server so that any modifications could
be done easily).  Through OLE I performed/completed the merge and saved the
combined templates to a generic document name, prompting the user if they
wanted to open/print the document.

This improved performance three times.  Let me know if you would like some
script samples?

HTH

"Jim G" <jim.gillett@dcyf.ri.gov> wrote in message
news:3f3a558d$1@forums-1-dub...
> Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.
It
> was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP
and
> it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect,
load
> a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same process
> takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.
>
> A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets us
> back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we have
> 800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.
>
> I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding
response
> time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other
than
> more RAM, for speeding things up?
>
> TIA,
> Jim
>
>

My experience with Word doesn't go that far back, but I've also played
with WordPerfect and, based on my experience, the issue is Word. I had
to do a whole bunch of extras to turn off Word "functionality" in
order to make my app work at a decent pace. Things like:

iole_Word.ActiveDocument.ShowSpellingErrors = FALSE
iole_Word.ActiveDocument.ShowGrammaticalErrors = FALSE
iole_Word.ScreenUpdating = FALSE
iole_Word.Options.SaveInterval = 0

Up to you whether you want to restore the values after.

Good luck,

Terry [TeamSybase] and Sequel the techno-kitten

On 13 Aug 2003 08:13:17 -0700, "Jim G" <jim.gillett@dcyf.ri.gov>
wrote:

>Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.  It
>was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP and
>it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect, load
>a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same process
>takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.
>
>A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets us
>back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we have
>800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.
>
>I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding response
>time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other than
>more RAM, for speeding things up?

Sequel's Sandbox: http://www.techno-kitten.com
Home of PBL Peeper, a free PowerBuilder Developer's Toolkit. 
Version 2.2.05 now available at the Sandbox
See the PB Troubleshooting Guide at the Sandbox
^ ^
o o
=*=

Jon,
Thanks for the response.  Interesting that you did not get significant
improvement with more RAM .  We do get significant improvement with more RAM
but we lack the funds to upgrade 800 machines at the moment.  Maybe it
depends on the nature of the documents and type of processing to be done.  I
am not ready to reengineer the process as yet but if it comes to that I may
follow up on your offer.
Jim

"Jon Pervan" <jon.pervan@leaseadmincorp.com> wrote in message
news:3f3a93b1$1@forums-2-dub...
> Jim I had a similar problem, and we went from 128 mb of RAM to 256 mb, but
> it was still to slow (due to XP's resource intensive app's)...
>
> In order to improve performance I had to change my way of thinking:
>
> Instead of populating the templates through OLE I created a master list of
> templates loaded with merge fields.  I then used FileExists, FileDelete,
> FileOpen, FileWrite to create a Merge file.
>
> I used OLE to create a new document, and inserted the various templates
> requested by the user (located on the server so that any modifications
could
> be done easily).  Through OLE I performed/completed the merge and saved
the
> combined templates to a generic document name, prompting the user if they
> wanted to open/print the document.
>
> This improved performance three times.  Let me know if you would like some
> script samples?
>
> HTH
>
> "Jim G" <jim.gillett@dcyf.ri.gov> wrote in message
> news:3f3a558d$1@forums-1-dub...
> > Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.
> It
> > was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP
> and
> > it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect,
> load
> > a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same
process
> > takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.
> >
> > A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets
us
> > back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we
have
> > 800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.
> >
> > I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding
> response
> > time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other
> than
> > more RAM, for speeding things up?
> >
> > TIA,
> > Jim
> >
> >
>
>

Terry,
I haven't used WordPerfect in years but I always thought it was better than
Word.  Too bad MS dominates the world as they do.  I will try your
suggestions and see what happens.  Thanks.
Jim


"Terry Voth" <sequel@techno-kitten.com> wrote in message
news:bdtljvk7iv369jk3nfp7rdgc0k5cf6g00v@4ax.com...
> My experience with Word doesn't go that far back, but I've also played
> with WordPerfect and, based on my experience, the issue is Word. I had
> to do a whole bunch of extras to turn off Word "functionality" in
> order to make my app work at a decent pace. Things like:
>
> iole_Word.ActiveDocument.ShowSpellingErrors = FALSE
> iole_Word.ActiveDocument.ShowGrammaticalErrors = FALSE
> iole_Word.ScreenUpdating = FALSE
> iole_Word.Options.SaveInterval = 0
>
> Up to you whether you want to restore the values after.
>
> Good luck,
>
> Terry [TeamSybase] and Sequel the techno-kitten
>
> On 13 Aug 2003 08:13:17 -0700, "Jim G" <jim.gillett@dcyf.ri.gov>
> wrote:
>
> >Our application has used Word through an OLE connection for many years.
It
> >was always sort of slow but recently we upgraded from Word 95 to Word XP
and
> >it got much slower.  With Word 95 it took about 15 seconds to connect,
load
> >a template, open a document and populate with data.  Now that same
process
> >takes about 40 seconds with Word XP.
> >
> >A typical user machine is 433mhz with 64 mb RAM.  Doubling the RAM gets
us
> >back down to about a 15 second response time.  The problem is that we
have
> >800 users and no money in the budget to add RAM to 800 machines.
> >
> >I am wondering if any of you have had similar experiences regarding
response
> >time with PB, Word and OLE?  Also, is anyone aware of any tricks, other
than
> >more RAM, for speeding things up?
>
> Sequel's Sandbox: http://www.techno-kitten.com
> Home of PBL Peeper, a free PowerBuilder Developer's Toolkit.
> Version 2.2.05 now available at the Sandbox
> See the PB Troubleshooting Guide at the Sandbox
> ^ ^
> o o
> =*=

My strategy was to use Word Macros instead of OLE, then call
the macros via DDE.  The result is much faster.  Now I am
looking into eliminating Word completely and using TE
Developer's Kit, which is even faster.

Sorry if this doesn't exactly address the question, but with
a carefully designed word macro, we are able to do very
significant processing.  Rather than controlling the work
interactively from PowerBuilder, we create a txt file in PB,
then run the Word Macro.  The Word Macro reads the txt file
and does its work.  This also has the advantage of freeing
up the PC so the user can go back to work in the PB app
while Word does its work.

HTH

VictorReinhart

TE Developers Kit sounds interesting.  Assuming that your app already has a
large number of Word documents associated with it, does TE allow you to
view/print those existing documents or is a conversion required (to .rtf) or
are they junk?

<VictorReinhart> wrote in message news:3f3ba5f4.7e71.846930886@sybase.com...
> My strategy was to use Word Macros instead of OLE, then call
> the macros via DDE.  The result is much faster.  Now I am
> looking into eliminating Word completely and using TE
> Developer's Kit, which is even faster.
>
> Sorry if this doesn't exactly address the question, but with
> a carefully designed word macro, we are able to do very
> significant processing.  Rather than controlling the work
> interactively from PowerBuilder, we create a txt file in PB,
> then run the Word Macro.  The Word Macro reads the txt file
> and does its work.  This also has the advantage of freeing
> up the PC so the user can go back to work in the PB app
> while Word does its work.
>
> HTH
>
> VictorReinhart