RC1 FAQ

A collection of notes relating to RC1

RC2 will be available shortly. Almost all the issues raised in this document are fixed in RC2.

The original Win32 binary snapshot had the wrong FILEVERSION number.

FILEVERSION is a hidden version resource stored as an integer. It is not visible from File | Properties. However, it is used by installation scripts to determine the version number of executables and dlls. The original release of the Win32 RC1 binary snapshot carried a FILEVERSION of 7.2. If these files are left in place it may confuse subsequent attempts to install new versions of Firebird or InterBase.

If you have been using the original release of RC1 (dated around 13-NOV-01) it is recommended that you manually delete the files in the \bin directory and, if necessary, gds32.dll from the %system32% directory, before installing an installable version of Firebird.

If you are installing from the RC1a binary snapshot then just copy the new binaries over the old ones (ie, exactly as you did when you first installed RC1.)

Status - Fixed in RC2

How can I tell which Win32 version of RC1 that I have?

The originally uploaded files have a variety of stamps dated up to 13-NOV-01. They were quietly replaced by binary snapshots with the correct FILEVERSION. The replacement binary snapshot was consistently date-time stamped 19-NOV-01 01:00:00.

RC1a is date-stamped 26-NOV-2001 01:00:00 and has a new build number of 612.

I thought that Firebird created new databases with Forced Writes=ON under Win32.

So did we. This is being looked at.

Status - Fixed in RC2

I have a query which used to work fine. Now I get this error:

SQL error code = -204 
Ambiguous field name between table/view TOKEN and table/view 

Firebird RC1 rejects queries that reference column names that are duplicated across table joins. The old behaviour could (and often would) generate a different result if the table order was inverted.

To simplify migration RC2 now allows ambiguous field names in queries if the database client is using Dialect 1.

Status - Enhanced in RC2

Is this why the InterSolv ODBC driver is having trouble working with RC1?

Unfortunately, yes. The driver uses ambiguous queries to extract metadata. RC2 provides a fix for this.

Status - Fixed in RC2

I heard that there is a bug with using Delete and the new FIRST statement.

Yes. This is true. And it is worth repeating again, because it is an easy way to accidentally delete all the data from a table. Delete and Commands like:

delete from table where col in (select col first 5 from table);

don't delete up to five rows, but the whole table. Obviously the subselect is executed for each row in master table. FIRST should put a brake on that but currently it is not.

Status - Outstanding. Not fixed in RC2

When I put -- comments anywhere into an SQL script I get something like

-SQL error code = -104
-Token unknown - line N, char X

However, it seems to be OK in the sub-scripts.

Yes, ISQL has trouble with -- style comments out.

Status - Fixed in RC2

Are you sure that the Linux build is 64bit? I tried to restore database and gbak terminated on 2Gb size.

No, the Linux build does not yet have 64-bit file i/o. The code has been added to the source tree, but we have not yet compiled and tested it properly for Linux. Currently the only platforms it is working on are Win32 and Darwin.

When it is available it will probably be as a separately compiled binary and will be marked as such. This is because 64-bit file i/o support is not ubiquitous on Linux.

Status - RC2 code base has much better support for building binaries with 64-bit file i/o

The Release Notes have very little information about the Firebird open bug list. Where can I find out more?

More details are available in the FirebirdBugsOpen.html. This is in the doc directory of the Windows zipped binary release. You can then click on the Sourceforge ID and jump straight to the original reports and any subsequent comments at the Firebird site on Sourceforge.

Alternatively go to the Sourceforge to browse the Bug Tracker database.

The release notes mention FBUDF.DLL. I can't find it.

Good point. It got missed from the build process. Expect to see it posted soon.

Trigger Position is ignored in RC1.

Beware if you have a database that relies on the trigger position value to control the firing sequence. It is currently ignored.

Status - Fixed in RC2

The following query worked fine under beta 2 but doesn't work under RC1:

SELECT X.CUST_NO, ABS(SUM(X.TOTAL_VALUE))
FROM SALES X
GROUP BY X.CUST_NO;

InterBase has never allowed group by statements on user-defined functions (UDFs). Firebird added that capability but the results are not yet consistent, so the feature has been withdrawn.

Status - Possibly fixed and re-introduced in RC2 - but feature has not been tested.