Estimated Time To Read This: 2 minutes       “Let us strive to improve ourselves, for we cannot remain stationary; one either progresses or retrogrades.” Mme. Du Deffand Wise words indeed from a lady who died over 230 years ago.  Some things never change. To get better or even to stay the best means continually improving oneself.  This is the same in life as it is in work. Speaking of work… We have a team of FileMaker developers – all ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 – 3 minutes       From the title you might assume I was going to dispense some “winterly” advice like “clear snow from around your vents on your house” or “keep snow cleared from around ground-level windows (so when it melts, water doesn’t seep in).” No, these just happen to be FileMaker tips and it’s January; hence, January Tips. Tip 1: If you administer FileMaker Server, you know you’ve had to set up an account and password that allows ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 minutes       Since 1999 CoreSolutions has published FileMaker Naming Standards. These standards are developed in an effort to share the efficiencies we’ve realized over the years by using a cohesive set of naming rules that make our systems recognizable by any of our developers, even in systems a decade old. When FileMaker Inc. published their FileMaker Development Conventions white paper in 2005, CoreSolutions was part of the team of independent developers that made that happen. It ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 3 – 5 minutes       When FileMaker Inc. released FileMaker Go for iOS 4 devices in July, it changed things for developers. All of a sudden we had a new platform for which to develop, and one that has unique opportunities and capabilities. It also left many of us scratching our collective heads after we played with it for a while and realized that using the same layouts designed for the desktop version of FileMaker Pro wouldn’t always be practical. I say scratching our heads ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 3 – 4 minutes       Have you ever created a FileMaker calculation that was a little complicated but it made sense at the time? And a few months later you look at that calculation again and you can’t figure it out? I have to admit, my memory is pathetic. If I don’t write stuff down or put it in an email, it’s gone by the next day. Same with constructing calculations: if I don’t document them or format them in such a way to make them easier to read, I often can’t understand ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 – 3 minutes       For the last week or so I’ve had the opportunity to do some development with FileMaker Go for the iPhone. As a new product, FileMaker Go shows lots of promise and room for growth. There are lots of really cool features, not the least of which is simply being able to take your data with you or access it on a server from outside the home or office. (Update: there has already been a new release of updates for FileMaker Go — check them out here) One awesome ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 minutes       Excitement that built in anticipation of FileMaker Inc.’s Developer Conference, taking place August 15 to 18 in San Diego, California, has finally broken! I have the privilege of attending this year’s DevCon, alongside another CoreSolutions developer (Matt Leering – check out his FileMaker blogs for handy tips) and we’ve looked forward to learning what other developers are doing with the products, and all the latest news from FileMaker and its community ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 minutes       This week FileMaker Inc. released updates for all the FileMaker products bringing them to version 11.0v2. You can find the download page by choosing “Check for Updates” from the Help menu in FileMaker Pro, FileMaker Pro Advanced or FileMaker Server Admin console, or by visiting this link. This update repairs a number of bugs in FileMaker Pro including a fix to snapshot links not recognizing files with external file references. Behaviour was also changed for merge ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 1 – 2 minutes       In FileMaker Pro 9 one of the major changes was a non-modal dialog for scripts and script editing. Along with that was the ability to put scripts in folders. Now in FileMaker Pro 11, that ability has been extended to layouts. An improved Manage Layouts dialog allows the developer to create folders of layouts as well as separators (appear as lines separating layout names). It also allows the developer to edit the layout options, show/hide in layout menus, re-order ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 1 – 2 minutes       It’s no DevCon but it is a gathering of FileMaker folk who love to share and discuss pertinent topics about FileMaker Pro. POE had its initial meet-up in New York in July 2009. That was followed up by a gathering in Portland this past January. Plans are being considered for the next one but in the meantime, you can view videos of some “gatherings” from the web site at www.pauseonerror.com. You can also subscribe to a video podcast on iTunes. If you’re on ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: < 1 minute       Make sure you have good backups using the built-in backup schedules in FileMaker Server. Take a copy and save them as clones with no data, especially after you’ve made changes to layouts, scripts or relationships. Clones will be essential if you develop any kind of corruption in your files. Periodically save your files as a compressed copy. This keeps the data but has routines that clean up the structure of the file. It’s the kind of practice that takes about ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 4 – 6 minutes       Almost exactly 18 months since the release of FileMaker 9, FileMaker Inc. released version 10 on January 5, 2009. Sporting a new interface on the main screen, gone is the old status area, replaced with a new customizable Status toolbar across the top of the screen. According to FMI, the toolbar has been redesigned to allow the user to perform common tasks with the fewest mouse clicks. Browse Mode Layout Mode Another new feature that changes the look of FileMaker ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 4 – 6 minutes       On July 10, 2007, FileMaker Inc. released the FileMaker Pro 9.0 family of products. The latest version uses the same file format as FileMaker Pro 7 through 8.5, so no conversion is necessary. This is a stunning new release with many great improvements and new features. Here are just a few of them. We’ll be writing about these, and others, in future articles. New Quick Start Screen – FileMaker Pro now has a new screen that appears when you start the ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 minutes       I wrote an article in For FileMaker Issue #24 about creating an “opener file” that would open FileMaker Pro, and automatically open a hosted file. A few years have passed since then, and I feel it’s time to update that article with a method that I use every day. For several versions, FileMaker has had the ability to recognize a certain URL format. Here’s a sample: Code block   fmp7://yourserver.com/yourfile.fp7 Entering this string in a browser will ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 2 – 3 minutes       A little-known feature of value lists is that you can select more than one value at a time and save those values in a single field in return-delimited format (values are separated by return characters). A checkbox value list is designed to work this way, but what about pop-up menus, drop-down lists and radio buttons? Even if they don’t appear to, these types of value lists will allow more than one value to be selected. Pop-up Menu and Radio Buttons Clicking on ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 6 – 10 minutes       Inspector is the latest solution analysis tool from FMNexus in the person of Vince Menanno. The About screen touts itself a “comprehensive diagnostic, debugging and documenting tool for FileMaker Professionals”. In our recent testing we have found this claim to be accurate. History Inspector grew from a previous product Vince created which was Analyzer. Analyzer was, we believe, the first tool of this kind to document the fields, layouts, scripts, ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 5 – 8 minutes       This year’s Developer’s Conference in Phoenix Arizona saw the introduction of a brand new application family: FileMaker Pro 8. The family includes FileMaker Pro, FileMaker Advanced (previously known as Developer), FileMaker Server and Server Advanced and FileMaker Mobile. The server products and Mobile won’t be shipping until later this year. Past history had many in the developer community wondering if the new features warranted a whole number ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 6 – 10 minutes       Among the hundreds of new features and functions in FileMaker Pro 7 is a brand new security model. At the heart of this new model is a new account and privilege management module consisting of Accounts, Passwords, Privilege Sets and Extended Privileges. This Isn’t Your Father’s FileMaker Since the early days of FileMaker, there have been passwords. For security, that’s all there was in fact. With FileMaker 7, passwords still exist (and ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 5 – 8 minutes       Just over 8 years ago, we announced the new features of a just-released FileMaker Pro v3.0. This past March saw the introduction of FileMaker Pro 7. In comparison, FileMaker Pro 7 boasts more new features over version 6 than version 3 did over 2. As if new features weren’t enough, many developers are also finding themselves grappling with a paradigm shift in how to think about databases. Some changes, and the ... Read More

Estimated Time To Read This: 4 – 6 minutes       One of the most long awaited FileMaker Pro features finally appeared in Version 6.0. Custom Dialogs allow the developer to include field values within the dialog text and to accept input from the user in up to three fields. This allows much greater flexibility in providing a truly interactive experience for the user. As with many new features, there are also ... Read More