Would much appreciate any feedback on this one:

1. Is it normal to take literally a few seconds for a computer to finish reading from server?
2. Initially this problem only happened on the server (where we have both the database and NUTD running), but it seems to be infecting other computers as well.
3. It's a frustrating problem as during this blackout with the spinning ball, nothing can be done within Now-Up-To-Date.
4. Of course, once we see "Public Events up to date", everything is back to normal.
5. This happens even when we have zero traffic during the weekend, with no other computers logging on, with a 1% red bar showing on the server traffic.

Any suggestions please?

I have noticed this as well, even though my localhost runs the server as well. My impression, and it is only an intuition, is that during the update process NUDC looks at many things that technically it does not need.

In that case, it is not a matter of traffic or of number of current user but of total information stored on the server and, depending how things are configured, what it knows about private users. That is the only thing which seems logical to me. And there is not anything that can be done in 5.3.1 to change this.

I will say that this is the exception in my environment and not the rule. It seems to happen mostly when a large-ish number of repeating items are added.

Thanks Mike. We're still stuck on this lengthy spinning ball problem. We have tried deleting the Now-Up-to-Date perferences but the software still freezes for a few seconds every now and then, extremely annoying to say the least!

If it is happening in version 5, make sure you are getting all the prefs in a refresh. Here is the Now Up-to-Date version 5 prefs refresh under OSX.

1. Make sure you know where your primary calendar file is stored on your hard drive. You'll need to know where it is to set it as your primary file again at the end of this process.
2. Quit Now Up-to-Date (if it is running).
3. Open a new Finder window and select Home from the Go menu.
4. Once in your Home folder, go to: /Library/Preferences/
5. Find the files named com.nowsoftware.nowuptodate.plist and com.poweronsoftware.nowuptodate.plist and move them to the desktop.
6. Find the folder named Now Up-to-Date Prefs and move it to the desktop as well.
7. Launch Now Up-to-Date, open the File menu, select Open, make sure there is a checkmark next to the option "Make this my primary file," locate your Now Up-to-Date calendar file, highlight it and click Open.
8. Open the File menu, select Save As...Save the file as the same name and location as the original. Click Yes to replace the original. This step should be taken periodically to optimize the file.
9. Trash the items moved to the desktop in steps 5 and 6.

If it is a busy calendar, with lot's of data going back years, it could also be a volume issue, or the frequency with which clients are updating. Make sure the local files are not doing their default updated sooner than five minutes. It may be beneficial to archive out older data and import it into an 'Archive' calendar file,