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GETTING STARTED WITH FUNDRAISER BASIC
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marked for deletion to be physically erased.
File Maintenance has a second, very important, purpose: rebuilding index
files. Over time, index files can get out of sync with the data files they relate
to; so, as a good housekeeping measure, you need to rebuild the index files
on a regular basis. If you use FundRaiser on a daily basis, you should run File
Maintenance once every week or so (if not more often); otherwise, once a
month is generally enough. It doesn’t hurt to run it more often. Also, if you
ever experience a disk error, you should include File Maintenance in your
recovery process:
• Run ScanDisk to find and fix any disk errors. In Windows98 and
newer, and in some newer versions of Win95, Windows does this on
startup if it was not shut down properly. If running an older version of
Win95, click on Start, Programs, Accessories, System Tools,
Scandisk. Choose the Standard test, and tell it to automatically fix
errors.
• Make a backup.
• Run File Maintenance.
• Run Data Integrity Check.
There are some clues to watch for which indicate that the indexes are out of
sync with the data: when you search for a name that you know is there, but
FundRaiser can’t find it; or when you get a report that seems to have the
wrong names listed for the criteria you selected. If you run File Maintenance
regularly, you should not see these problems occur.
Check Data Integrity
Computers inevitably fail. When that happens your data may become
corrupted. This menu choice will help you make sure that your data is in
good shape. When you run this, you can have it look over your data without
fixing it, and that is what we suggest you do first. If the resulting report
suggests that you run it again to make some fixes, then you can put a
checkmark on that option. (When you do so, a checkmark will appear in the
“Make Backup” option, and you should leave it checked in chase you need
to restore your data if the fix fails for any reason.) This routine tests four things:
1. Duplicate Account Numbers: One problem that can result from corrupted
data is that FR can erroneously assign duplicate account numbers to new
records. This results in contribution data being “shared” between the two
accounts that have the same account number. The fix is for FR to assign new
account numbers. You may also have to do some manual deleting and rewww.FundRaiserBasic.com
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