Hi Helen, Stefan

Thanks for the help, appreciated as always.

There are some interesting points there.

My installation routine puts fbclient.dll in the same folder as the
app so going on what you have said it should find it ok. But i do
specify no gds32 So if at any time its needed that may be the problem.
On my development machines I have found copies of gds32.dll so if the
hypothesis is correct it may explain I have never seen any problems.

However, (i'm trying to get more information from the guy) I get the
impression that this error does not happen all the time, sometimes the
software runs fine.

I have found out that apparantly he runs the software while being
connected to his work's LAN network, allows the laptop to go into
sleep mode, takes the laptop home, and then when he goes to use the
software it crashes...... I as assuming he has the fbserver running on
his laptop (I've asked and as I offer 'network' and 'standalone'
versions of the software it could be either) Not sure how that impacts
on the problem.

Pete

--- In firebird-support@yahoogroups.com, Stefan Heymann <lists@...> wrote:
>
> >> machine.Undefined service gds_db/tcp..
>
> > It means either that port 3050 is firewalled [...] or something else
> > has commandeered port 3050.
>
> Sorry, Helen. But "Undefined service" means just that: the network
> subsystem is unable to resolve a request to a TCP service named
> "gds_db" into a port number. Which means that there is no such entry
> in the "services" file.
>
> The question is: why does the network subsystem even try to resolve
> this service? To me, it seems there is a GDS32.DLL involved. IbObjects
> seems to fall back to GDS32.DLL when it doesn't find what you have
> specified in IB_Constants.IB_GDS32.
>
> @Pete: Is there a GDS32.DLL anywhere on the machine that gives this
> error? (especially in the Windows\System32 directory?) Or is there/has
> there been an InterBase server/client app installed?
>
> When you just specify "fbclient.dll" as the library name, the order
> that the Windows API LoadLibrary searches for this library is (see
> Windows API documentation):
>
> 1. The directory from which the application loaded.
> 2. The current directory.
> 3. Windows 95: The Windows system directory.
> Windows NT: The 32-bit Windows system directory (Windows\System32)
> 4. Windows NT: The 16-bit Windows system directory (Windows\System)
> 5. The Windows directory.
> 6. The directories that are listed in the PATH environment variable.
>
> LoadLibrary *will not* search for fbclient.dll in the bin directory of
> your Firebird installation (unless you uncluded this in your PATH
> environment variable, which would be rather unusual).
>
> What you can do:
> - Open the Registry and search for
> HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Firebird Project\Firebird Server\Instances
> - There is a value named "DefaultInstance" here that gives the name of
> the Firebird directory ("C:\Programme\Firebird\" here on my machine)
> - Add this directory to your fbclient.dll library name:
>
> IB_Constants.IB_GDS32 := FirebirdDir + '\bin\' + 'fbclient.DLL';
>
> If you can't find the key in the registry, fbclient.dll should be
> directly in the application directory (this will work, you don't have
> to install the complete Firebird Client to get client access for an
> application, see
> http://www.destructor.de/firebird/1.5/minimumclient.htm ) or in the
> System32 directory.
>
>
> Best Regards
>
> Stefan
>
>
> --
> Stefan Heymann
> www.destructor.de/firebird
>