Particles jitter when stationary
Check that Compensate Drift is on. If still jittery, reduce FLIP Ratio slightly (try 80) to get a more damped feel.
Particles squirt through my Collider
Bump Pressure Iterations to 100 or higher, and check that Collider Mode matches what you want (Outside vs. Outline).
Water flows out the sides even with Open Boundaries off
Ensure your Solid layer covers the full comp area. Water is constrained to the effect-layer's bounds.
The simulation looks different on my colleague's Mac
Shouldn't happen. The solver is deterministic: identical configuration plus identical inputs produce byte-identical results across machines. If you see differences, file a bug with the project file.
Effect Controls shows outdated values after I changed a parameter
Rarely, click the Effect header to collapse and expand. AE sometimes caches old parameter values in the UI.
FRAME:Xms stays at 0
Bake is turned on and the frame is served from cache with no simulation work left to do. Disable Bake or use Clear Bake to measure again.