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12 Days of FileMaker 12: Quick Table View

April 23, 2012 by Susan Fennema Leave a Comment

Table View might just be one of the least appreciated features in the FileMaker Pro product line. True, it has hardly changed in versions 7 through 9, and the changes in 10 were welcome but fairly simple.

Table View in FileMaker Pro

All that changed in 11 with the addition of two bold new features that allow a developer to create a table quickly and perform summary analyses, all without ever leaving the comfort of browse mode. FileMaker 12 brings welcome refinements to this important family of features and makes Table View a tool worthy of a fresh look.

In this session from the 12 Days of FileMaker 12, we explore practical uses of Table View and showcase changes to it.

About Mark Richman

Mark Richman is the CEO and founder of Skeleton Key, a FileMaker Business Alliance Platinum level member based in St. Louis, Missouri. He leads a team of Certified Developers and an IT consulting division in providing multi-platform development and technology consulting for customers in a broad array of markets.  He is certified in FileMaker versions 8 through 11 and an Authorized FileMaker Trainer.

When Mark isn’t running his company or wrestling with his four sons, you can find him writing TechNet articles for FileMaker Inc.; speaking at the FileMaker Developer Conference; or evangelizing about how to get the best performance out of your FileMaker application.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: 12 Days of FileMaker 12, FileMaker 12, Layout objects, Video

12 Days of FileMaker 12: Layout Mode Enhancements

April 16, 2012 by Susan Fennema Leave a Comment

FileMaker 12 provides powerful new features to align, position and manage objects on your layouts.In this session from the 12 Days of FileMaker 12, see how these powerful new features will help you design more consistent and graphically pleasing application.

Layout Enhancements in FileMaker Pro

This video walks through a review of the new features and how they can be used to balance your layout designs and improve workflow.

About John Mathewson

John Mathewson is President and co-founder of KyoLogic a custom software development firm in Westport, Connecticut.  He is an organizational design expert and works to create systems that improve productivity and increase business intelligence. Since 1986, John has developed database applications in Visual FoxPro, MySQL and FileMaker Pro. He is a certified FileMaker 7, 8, 9, 10 and 11 developer.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: 12 Days of FileMaker 12, FileMaker 12, Layout objects, Video

12 Days of FileMaker 12: Layout Design Surface

April 9, 2012 by Susan Fennema Leave a Comment

When designing new modules or systems, one bottleneck to the turnaround time involves the development of interfaces. The layout design surface of FileMaker Pro 12 has given us tools to streamline interface development, revamp layout themes, and additional control of objects with the Inspector.

Layout Design Tools in FileMaker Pro

In this session from the 12 Days of FileMaker 12, we explore examples of these new layout design tools.

About Sameer Khan

Sameer Khan is the presenter. He is a FileMaker 9-11 Certified Developer and Authorized Trainer employed by Anvil Dataworks, a development firm outside of Washington DC. He has been working with FileMaker for over eight years. His students say that he is an interesting person and a knowledgeable teacher.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: 12 Days of FileMaker 12, FileMaker 12, Layout objects, Video

12 Days of FileMaker 12: Charting Enhancements

April 9, 2012 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

A picture is worth a thousand words; a chart is worth 10,000 records. In version 11, FileMaker introduced the ability to chart your data natively. In this session from the 12 Days of FileMaker 12. we explore the changes made in the charting engine of FileMaker 12.

Charting Enhancements in FileMaker Pro

This video uses real solutions to enhance the existing charts. In addition, we will review the new chart types and under what scenarios they would be useful.

About Jerry Salem

Jerry Salem began his career in technology as a computer science major, eventually moving to the biological sciences where he earned his Ph.D. in Biochemistry. During that time, he published papers on malaria, tuberculosis, and AIDS. He holds a U.S. patent and has spoken internationally on numerous topics.

As a researcher, Jerry learned computer networking, web design, and FileMaker. He has worked in various technology fields developing a number of solutions, including electronic medical records software and complex systems for many businesses and organizations. Along the way, he has mastered standard SQL tools and a variety of other technologies.

Since 2007, Jerry has worked at IT Solutions, a Platinum level member of the FileMaker Business Alliance. Among his accomplishments since joining ITS are certification in FileMaker versions 8 through 11 and frequent contributions to the Philly FileMaker User Group.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: 12 Days of FileMaker 12, FileMaker 12, Layout objects, Reporting, Video

5 Techniques for Building a Solution with FileMaker Go

October 25, 2011 by Susan Fennema 3 Comments

With FileMaker Go, developers can use the power of FileMaker Pro with the flexibility of a mobile device. But with a new platform comes new methods, techniques and expectations. Leveraging the power of FileMaker Go is not just about understanding core development skills but understanding the benefits and limitations of the mobile platform.

Building a Solution with FileMaker Go

Topics in this video include:

  • Why choose FileMaker Go
  • Differences between Pro and Go
  • User expectations on a mobile device
  • Techniques to build an efficient solution
  • Techniques for a clean and user-friendly interface

About Martha Zink

The presenter is our own Martha Zink, Advocate of Awesomeness. Her customers include Apple, Inc., Baylor College of Medicine and Diamond Display Group. She is the creator of the 11 Days of FileMaker 11 video series and a speaker at technology events like the FileMaker 11 Road Show, PauseOnError 2011 and FileMaker DevCon 2011.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: FileMaker Go, Video

Enhancing the Interface With Filtered Portals

May 25, 2011 by Martha Zink 3 Comments

Screen shot of filtered portal demo

Recently, I’ve heard some push back when it comes to using filtered portals in solutions. The reason? Filtered portals are slow for large data sets. And this is a fair point. However, filtered portals and I have a close bond for reasons beyond their Brita-like tendencies of leaving the good and filtering out the unwanted. I love using filtered portals because they can enhance the interface, while providing flexibility for the developer.

Screen shot of filtered portal demo

Recently, a customer wanted to streamline a process and I decided to implement a checklist to get this done. Of course a simple checklist isn’t enough, as each step that uses the system should be clickable so that the user is taken to the right place to complete the necessary action. In the past, how would I have accomplished this?

Two Solutions

I can think of two solutions:

  1. A slew of text boxes with scripts attached to each
  2. A portal to a table that shows me the task and description with a rank field to sort them correctly

So before the birth of filtered portals, I could have accomplished what I want with #2 above. So why the admiration for the filtered portal? The filtering capability means I can use one table to house different checklists, and when I go to apply a portal with a new filter calculation to a new layout, a little copy/paste and I’m nearly done. All that’s left to do is change the calculation for the filtered portal. In pre-FileMaker 11, I would have created a different relationship for each type of checklist. Less table occurrences makes for a happier developer!

In the example of my customer, there are two different types of checklists: the input and the output. The input is all about how they enter the data. The output is all the “printables” – invoices, project details, project summary, etc.

Setting Up a Filtered Portal

Let’s talk technical – here are the fields I setup in my checklist table:

  • Type – identifies different checklists
  • Description – what the user sees
  • Parameter – what the script will use to perform the correct action and take the user to the right place
  • Rank – what the portal uses to correctly sort the checklist

How are my portals filtered? By the field “type.” An example would be as follows:

data_checklist::Type = "Input"

Nice and simple, right? Let’s kick it up a notch, á la Emeril Lagasse.

Imagine if you had an Issues database. What if a list of suggested questions or actions were provided, based on the scenario? Instead of hard coding the actual type, you can reference a field in your table:

data_checklist::type = data::category

Conclusion

So let’s step out of the proverbial box and into the world of possibilities – I’ve used filtered portals more for interface enhancement than for true data filtering, but what’s the harm in that? In fact, using filtered portals in this form helps the developer in adding flexibility via relationships and scripts. By abstracting the interface into a relationship and filtered portals, often modifying the interface can be as simple as adding a new record in a table.

Want to see these techniques in action? Check out my sample file! I’m using the table “Checklist” for the filtered portals in both examples.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: Demo file, Filtered portals

Sneaky Portal Deletion

May 3, 2011 by Martha Zink 4 Comments

As FileMaker developers, we often use a bit of interface trickery to make things appear as just regular old fields on a regular old layout, when in fact portals, filtered or not, may be hidden on the layout. Well when we use hidden “stuff,” we sometimes confuse the user when it doesn’t behave like regular “stuff.” In this blog entry and video, I’ll walk you through a scenario where portals and script triggers can work together to make for a seamless experience.

In this example, I have an item table. On the layout there is a portal, or a related table, where the user can enter different numbers representing PMS colors. To ensure good data modeling, I used a separate table and not just 8 fields called “Color_1” through “Color_8.”

Now imagine this scenario:

The user enters a new item. She types 108 in the first color field (really a related field), then types 2100 in the second color field, and lastly 301 in the third color field. She then realizes that 2100 is not for this item and deletes the value from the field. Structurally, this item record has 3 related records, even though there are only 2 values in the PMS color field. Now the user wonders, “Why is there a gap between color 1 and color 3?” and the developer is stuck cleaning up the data or error trapping for these “empty” records.

To solve the issue, I’ve created a simple script that uses the OnObjectExit script trigger. When the user exits any of the PMS color fields, the script checks to see if the color field for that related record is empty. If it is not empty, then nothing happens. If it is empty, the script deletes that portal row. No “empty” fields, no “empty” related records!

Check out the video and let me know what you think.


Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: Video

Beautifying Browse Mode, Functionality in Find Mode

April 5, 2011 by Martha Zink 1 Comment

The Problem

Ever since sub-summary parts started working in Browse mode, developers have been using them to enhance list layouts. The catch? Find mode.

If you place a field in a sub-summary part, the user is unable to enter the field in Find mode since it is not in the body part. So while the technique adds functionality in one mode, it removes it from another.

The Solution

Watch this short video and learn how conditional formatting and field  behavior can solve the issue. With “hidden” fields and “no entry” in Browse mode, you preserve the beauty of Browse mode and keep the functionality of Find mode.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: Video

Reporting Dashboards

April 4, 2011 by Anders Monsen Leave a Comment

With the advent of native charting in FileMaker Pro 11 developers can take advantage of powerful tools to design reporting dashboards to visually display critical information.

Images can convey information at a glance. Images can also overwhelm. A dashboard design should recognize that in order to communicate information effectively, the key is to illuminate, not overwhelm. Bright graphics and visual effects may have the opposite impact, hiding the data among fancy design and slowing down the user’s ability to interpret information.

Reporting in FileMaker entails sorting and sub-summary layout parts. The basis for any dashboard is almost the same. Data must be sorted and grouped. Charts can exist either as graphs alongside text, such as lists or sub-summary reports, or on specially crafted layouts focused on images only. The latter could display a variety of data from several different sources, all gathered and grouped in ways that make logical sense. I would argue that only the latter is a real dashboard, for while charts can greatly enhance data around it, a dashboard is essentially summary data only, and mostly graphical in nature.

Native FileMaker Pro charts come in only five variations—bar, horizontal bar, line, area, and pie. In addition, there are limits on how one can customize the appearance of each type. Labels with the chart appear untouchable; here a calculation option with Tooltips can prove invaluable. We can, to a limited degree, manipulate the dimensions of the charts by affecting other elements around it, such as the title and label size.

In order to best convey information about data through charts one has to select not just the right type, but consider size, what should appear in the labels, and color. One set of data might make perfect sense as a horizontal bar chart, and no sense in a pie chart.

Charts displayed within a record often require minimal preparation. Dashboards, where different sources can be combined into a single layout, usually require scripting in order to combine all of the elements. In brief, these scripts gather data points into global variables, for labels and/or values, with the last step switching to the dashboard layout where the charts are set up to receive the global variables and display the data.

Incorporating dashboards into FileMaker solutions is now easier than ever, with no need for plug-ins or external data such as the Google Chart API through web viewers. This graphical way of viewing reporting data can enhance solutions and provide developers and users with new tools to understand their data.

Filed Under: Layout Design Tagged With: FileMaker 11, Reporting

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