Poor Performance in Apple Works

[bjkatsetos]

I've noticed on several of the Macs that I administer to when opening an Appleworks document off of our server the performance seems to drastically decrease. When you go to type a word, for example, it might take several seconds to appear. I've already done a virus scan and cleaned off several macros viruses, replace network cable, moved ports in the switch, performed app upgrades and OS upgrades, Run maintenance scripts, updated prebindings, deleted the swap file, run system optimization tools. All the machines are running OS X 10.3. The ones in questions only have 256 MB of RAM, however we have several Macs running the same hardware config and are not affected. We also have a new Mac Mini (Power PC) that is experiencing the same issues. Any ideas on how to boost the performance and solve the issue?

 

[RickAce]

I am experiencing the same thing. G3-400 w/ 512megs Ram; OSv10.4.8.

When running Appleworks v6.2.9 and using the database I get the spinning beachball everytime I go do anything (type, find, etc.). I move my database over to an E-Mac and no such problems (same OS and memory).

Makes me think that Apple has put some code in AppleWorks that causes it to bog down in anything less than a G4 processor.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

 

[RickAce]

Check out the following:

SYMPTOMS
Is AppleWorks slow to open? Does the wait cursor (spinning ball) appear every time you change a document (eg typing characters)?

SOLUTION
These symptoms are usually caused by a full Recent Items folder, or less commonly, a full Auto Save folder. Follow these steps to empty the Recent Items folder or Auto Save folder.

1. Quit AppleWorks.

2. Locate the Recent Items and delete the aliases inside it.

If you're using Mac OS X the Recent Items folder can be found at:
<YourMacintoshHD/Users/YourName/Documents/AppleWorks User Data/Starting Points/Recent Items>.

If you're using Mac OS 8 or 9 you can find the Recent Items folder at:
<YourMacintoshHD/Documents/AppleWorks User Data/Starting Points/Recent Items>.

3. Locate the Auto Save folder and delete the documents inside it.

If you're using Mac OS X the Auto Save folder can be found at:
<YourMacintoshHD/Users/YourName/Documents/AppleWorks User Data/AutoSave>.

If you're using Mac OS 8 or 9 you can find the Auto Save folder at:
<YourMacintoshHD/Documents/AppleWorks User Data/AutoSave>.

4. If you do not use either the Recent Items or Auto Save (aka Auto Recovery) features of AppleWorks you can disable them from the AppleWorks Preferences.

To disable either of these preferences:

a. In Mac OS X, start AppleWorks and choose the AppleWorks > Preferences > General menu. In Mac OS 8 or 9, start AppleWorks and choose the Edit > Preferences > General menu.
b. Select the Files option in the Topic popup menu.
c. Uncheck the Auto-Save and Recent Items checkboxes.
d. Click the OK button.

In the longer term you can manage your Recent Items folder by using the AppleScripts referred to in these User FAQs:

Recent Documents don't appear/are not updated
<<a href="/WebX?50@@.2cd825e6"> Dale Gillard, "Recent documents don't appear/are not updated", 05:34am May 20, 2002 CDT>

No More Recent Items
<<a href="/WebX?50@@.3bc1c6df"> KOENIG Yvan, "No more Recent Items", 02:59am Apr 20, 2003 CDT>

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=122003

 

[RickAce]

Test only

 

[DeltaMac]

Not sure what might be happening in a database, but extremely slow response to text is an easy fix.
Quit AppleWorks if open.
Open your user/Documents/AppleWorks User Data folder
Open Starting Points/Recent Items.
You should see a maximum of 10 items there. If you see hundreds, or even thousands of items (I've seen 3 or 4,000 a couple of times), then delete everything from that Recent Items folder.
The problem will already be fixed.
Open AppleWorks, then appleWorks/Preferences/General/Text, and turn off Recent Items, or change the number of Items to less than 10 if you like to see your recently created files.
And, slow response is fixed...

 

[RickAce]

DeltaMac... thanks for your reply... I posted this solution earlier today but for some reason it had to be approved (HTML Web Links?)... still waiting for it to be approved!