After talking with Microsoft I resolved the problem with slow save. After the transaction is committed, the business object uses the FLUSH command to save the data to disk. MM uses the command FLUSH FORCE, which is only partly supported in 8.0. The FORCE part of the command was never implemented in 8.0, which forces the data to disk immediately. Because of this, the operating system flushes the files when it deems necessary. Issuing the same command in 9.0 forces all the open files to flush immediately. In 9.0, you can control which file you want to flush by issuing the correct parameter—FLUSH IN &lcAlias FORCE.

The command works in both versions because anything following the FLUSH command is ignored in 8.0. On a form with many business objects, issuing FLUSH FORCE in 9.0 took quite awhile because of all the open files that were being forced to disk. Obviously it’s preferable to flush the file immediately after the transaction is committed, but only if the file being acted upon is flushed and not every open file.