> > I am the developer of a free program with over 2,000 users, currently
> > using Sybase Adaptive Server Anywhere for its database. For various
> > reasons, I'm considering switching to Firebird.
>
> A fortnight ago, we moved a large web-based system, with a large number
> of users, to Firebird. We use FB 1.5.2 Classic on a multi-CPU Windows
> 2003 server, and administer it using InterBase Expert.
>
> It's early days yet, so my experience should not be considered typical.
> But I can say that so far: i) we've had no database corruption; ii) once
> we'd re-designed our indexes and queries, performance has been good;
> iii)
> garbage collection causes us some problems--extended and uncontrollable

set your garbage collection to 0 (i.e. for it not to run automatically) and
then schedule a backup every night in low use periods. The garbage
collection is then in your control.
Alan

> periods when the database works very hard; iv) the database has hung on
> several occasions, and sometimes refused to accept new connections--we
> suspect these problems may be caused by IBE rather than Firebird; v)
> I've
> found this email list very helpful :-)
>
> Ian.