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Happy New Year!

January 7, 2016 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

It’s been a while since we’ve posted a blog article. We’ve been making some changes in our business and wanted to fill you in on what we’ve been up to.

First, MightyData is moving away from software development and into business and technical consulting. Don’t worry – if you are a current customer, we will continue to serve you. MightyData is still a FileMaker Business Alliance member.

However, we are transitioning away from straight development work. Starting this year, we will begin sharing more strategic messages through this blog and fewer “how to” technology-based posts.

Second, we’ve been working on creating another brand, Art of Value. This is the only time that we will talk about Art of Value through the MightyData blog, but we thought you might be interested in hearing what we’ve been up to on that front.

Art of Value is a business consultancy that teaches people how to set themselves free of timesheets, and serve customers better, all while increasing income. We can show you how to implement a new business model to accomplish those goals. We have almost 80 podcast episodes with great content.

Tonight at 6:30pm CST, we are hosting a free webinar. Sign up and see what we’ve been up to.

Here is what you can learn on the webinar:

  1. how to overcome the biggest obstacle to increasing your income. (It’s not what you think it is.)
  2. how to implement a business model that, once you embrace it, makes it possible to experience bigger increases than you can even imagine.
  3. a strategy to increase the probability of your customer saying “yes” by 50%.
  4. how you can charge a higher price and have your customers thank you for it.

There will be a couple of free gifts for you on the webinar, but you need to sign up and show up to collect your gifts.

We wish you a very successful 2016!

Filed Under: MightyData Culture, News, Pricing Tagged With: Consulting, value pricing

Thank You For The Awards

September 5, 2012 by Kirk Bowman 2 Comments

for Outstanding Contribution to the FileMaker Community

At the 2012 FileMaker Developer Conference, MightyData was surprised and honored to receive two awards, one from FileMaker Inc. and the other from my colleagues in the FileMaker Community.

The FileMaker Mad Dog Award is given to individuals for their contribution in helping to advance awareness of the FileMaker platform. This is our third Mad Dog Award over the last decade. Thank you to Kevin Mallon at FileMaker Inc. for selecting us again for this recognition.

Mad Dog Award

The FileMaker Excellence Award is given to partners in the FileMaker Business Alliance (FBA) for an impressive level of professionalism and creativity in using FileMaker software to deliver excellent solutions to their customers. I was humbled to receive the award for Outstanding Contribution to the FileMaker Community. I  want to express my sincere appreciation to my friends in the FBA for nominating me and the team at FileMaker Inc. for selecting me.

Receiving FileMaker Excellence Award

for Outstanding Contribution to the FileMaker Community

Thank you to our customers and colleagues in the FileMaker community!

Filed Under: News

Implementing Effective Security

May 15, 2012 by Susan Fennema Leave a Comment

Announcing our next free webinar Implementing Effective Security on Wednesday, June 6, at 12pm CST. The webinar is part of a series of one-hour lunch-and-learn sessions for intermediate FileMaker Pro users and developers.

Implementing a proper security model often requires going beyond controlling whether or not someone can log into a database. FileMaker Pro includes a robust set of features for controlling which users have access to what information and what they can do with that information via the accounts and privileges settings.

This webinar will explore how to isolate legitimate users from sensitive operations or information within a database, how to associate privileges with authenticated accounts, and how to control specific features within a database based on a given user’s assigned privileges.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: Video

FileMaker Feud 2011: Round 3 Questions

November 21, 2011 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

Here are the questions and answers from the final round of FileMaker Feud at FileMaker DevCon 2011. The contest was down to two developers, Laura Betz and Lee Lukehart. Do you think coming up with these answers was easy? Watch the video from Round 3 and see the journey to become the FileMaker Feud Champion.

9. Name a reason to use a global field in FileMaker Pro.

  • Relationship Key – 18
  • Storing Graphics – 14
  • Filtered Portal – 13
  • Access Data in Any Context – 12
  • Unique Value for Each User Session – 11
  • Temporary Storage – 10
  • Data Entry in Custom Dialog – 6
  • Preferences – 5

10. Name a third-party technology you can integrate with FileMaker Pro.

  • ODBC/SQL/ESS – 18
  • SuperContainer – 15
  • Plugins – 14
  • PHP – 13
  • Web Technologies – 6
  • Web Services – 6
  • OS/Shell Scripting – 5
  • Calendars – 5

11. Name a reason to use an OnOpen script in FileMaker Pro.

  • Set Global Variables – 19
  • Configure User Environment – 16
  • Preset Global Fields – 15
  • Security – 9
  • Layout Navigation – 8
  • Display Splash Screen – 6
  • Install Plugins – 4
  • Create Session Record – 4

We had a blast creating and hosting FileMaker Feud. You can watch the videos from Round 1 and Round 2 to see the story unfold from the beginning. You can also find the questions and answers on our blog (Questions 1-5, Questions 6-8).

Filed Under: News Tagged With: DevCon, FileMaker Feud

FileMaker Go: Functionality with Anchors

November 3, 2011 by Martha Zink 6 Comments

iPad Safety app in landscape orientation

One of the cool things with FileMaker Go is the capability of using anchors (also known as auto resizing) to stretch the layout in portrait and landscape mode. I saw this technique at DevCon and thought it was such a great way to take advantage of that functionality.

Getting Started

In this screenshot, we’re looking at a safety database in Portrait mode. My anchors are on the left and top for everything except the “Comments” field, which has anchors on the bottom as well, and the signature button that has anchors on the left and bottom.

iPad safety app in portrait orientation

Now once the user turns the device landscape, VOILA! We get a new “side panel” that wasn’t there before. Where did that come from?!

iPad Safety app in landscape orientation

Using Anchors

Cool stuff, right? The way to do it is to anchor the side bar to the top and right. Then, group the layout objects (very important!) and overlap the grouped objects to line up to the right margin of the “portrait section”. From there, all that’s left to do is to push the grouped objects to the back, so that the “portrait section” is in full view and the “landscape section”, or the side bar, is hidden. Simple as that!

You have to make sure to group the layout objects. But, let’s pretend that you forgot – once you push those objects behind the “portrait section” it’ll take quite a lot of manual work to find the objects individually. So you don’t HAVE TO in order for the technique to work, but it sure does save you from a lot of object selecting!

Seperate portrait and landscape layers

Here are two screenshots in Layout Mode, to show you what the two sections look like. In the second screenshot, I haven’t yet pushed the grouped “landscape section” to the back.

Landscape layer on top of portrait layer

Have you implemented any technique like this into your FM Go solution?

Filed Under: News Tagged With: FileMaker Go, Layout objects, Video

FileMaker Feud 2011: Round 3

October 21, 2011 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

It is time for the final round of FileMaker Feud. In this last video (see Round 1 and Round 2), Laura Betz and Lee Lukehart, assisted by our MightyData coaches, go head-to-head to see who is the FileMaker Feud Champion.

We had a great time hosting the event and appreciate all the positive feedback we received from the community. We are looking forward to hosting the next FileMaker Feud sometime in 2012.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: DevCon, FileMaker Feud, Video

FileMaker Feud 2011: Round 2 Questions

October 10, 2011 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

Here are the questions and answers from the 2nd round of FileMaker Feud at FileMaker DevCon 2011. This round was tougher because the teams were cut in half–fewer people to help guess the answers. Watch the video of Round 2 to see who makes it to the finals.

6. Name the most powerful native calculation function in FileMaker Pro.

  • Let – 40
  • Evaluate – 18
  • Substitute – 6
  • GetNthRecord – 6
  • Case – 5
  • List – 4
  • If – 3
  • Get Function – 3

7. Name the most powerful script step in FileMaker Pro.

  • Set Field – 15
  • Set Variable – 13
  • Set Field By Name – 11
  • Perform Script – 11
  • IF / Else IF – 11
  • Delete All Records – 9
  • Go To Related Record – 7
  • Replace Field Contents – 4

8. Name a menu command that was replaced by a setting in the Inspector palette in FileMaker Pro 11.

  • Field Behavior – 18
  • Field Format – 16
  • Set Tooltip – 14
  • Text Format – 10
  • Sliding & Printing – 9
  • Alignment – 8
  • Date Format – 3

You can watch the Round 1 video (very funny) and questions also.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: DevCon, FileMaker Feud, Video

FileMaker Feud 2011: Round 1 Questions

October 7, 2011 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

By popular request, here are the questions and answers from the 1st round of FileMaker Feud at FileMaker DevCon 2011. Watch the video of Round 1 to see who advances to the next level.

1. Name a reason to choose FileMaker Pro over another development environment.

  • Rapid Development – 44
  • Ease of Use – 19
  • Cross Platform – 8
  • Return On Investment – 7
  • Flexibility – 7

2. Name a logical calculation function in FileMaker Pro 11.

  • Case – 41
  • IsEmpty – 11
  • If – 11
  • Let – 6
  • Choose – 4
  • Not – 3
  • Evaluate – 3

3. Name the feature in FileMaker Pro 9-11 that has done the most to change how developers create solutions.

  • Script Triggers – 45
  • Variables – 12
  • External SQL Source (ESS) – 8
  • Conditional Formatting – 7
  • Multiple Tables in Single File – 3
  • ESS – 3

4. Name a Get function commonly used in FileMaker Pro 11.

  • Get ( CurrentDate ) – 24
  • Get ( ScriptParameter ) – 23
  • Get ( FoundCount ) – 11
  • Get ( LastError ) – 9
  • Get ( AccountName ) – 6
  • Get ( LastMessageChoice ) – 3

5. Name a script step that does not work in Instant Web Publishing.

  • Show Custom Dialog – 24
  • Export Records – 9
  • Enter Preview Mode – 9
  • Save Records As PDF – 8
  • Import Records – 6
  • Freeze Window – 5
  • Print – 4
  • Beep – 4

I will publish the questions and answers from Round 2 and Round 3 later this month.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: DevCon, FileMaker Feud

FileMaker Music Survey

September 27, 2011 by Matt Navarre 4 Comments

Chart by skill level

Within the FileMaker community, there seem to be several subcultures. Music, photography, woodworking, and knitting just to name a few. At DevCon, we used to have a jam session that was generally packed with too many people wanting to play and sing. We had to impose limits such as only play for 3 songs, and then hand off the guitar or drum kit to the next person in line.

As a musician, I wondered if there was a link between music and FileMaker development – perhaps they are both forms of creative expression, or linked to skill in logic and math? Is there a correlation between expertise in the two fields? How many developers are also musicians?

The Survey: Musician or Not

Matt Navarre and Alexis Allen, both musicians and developers, devised a short survey to hopefully answer some of these questions. Alexis was a little skeptical, since she knows lots of musicians who aren’t terribly good with computers. Matt was more confident, having been at those jam sessions, waiting in line to play guitar.

In a 3 week period, we got 95 responses to the survey, which is a pretty small sample size, and hopefully enough to draw some conclusions. 80% of people surveyed reported being musicians. I suspect that number is skewed, since this was called the ‘FileMaker music survey’, and was more likely to attract a musician.

  • Music Skill – Of the musicians, 92% claim to be intermediate or expert level, and the other 8% identify as beginners. This shows that the musicians in the community tend strongly to be accomplished.
  • Developer Skill – Of non-musicians, 42% claim to be Intermediate developers, and 32% claim to be experts. Of musicians, 38% claim to be Intermediate or above, and 65% claim to be experts.

Chart by skill level

That means musicians are twice as likely to be database experts. This strong correlation is perhaps the most surprising data in this survey. We are making no claims of causation here, but we sure wonder what causes expertise in databases.

Of those with undergraduate or graduate music degrees, 72% claim to be experts. This seems to indicate the that more expertise you have as a musician, the more likely you are to also be an expert with FileMaker. This is strong evidence that there is indeed a link, and that musical training (and not merely talent or skill) somehow influences your ability to excel in FileMaker development.

Link Between Music and FileMaker

One of the questions we asked was whether you perceive a link between expertise in music and FileMaker. 58% of the non musicians reported zero link, and only one person reported a significant link. 18% of the musicians reported zero link, and 30% reported a significant link. The remaining 52% reported a small to moderate link. This seems to indicate that if you are both a musician and developer you’re far more likely to perceive a link. What would the nature of this link be? Does it make it easier to learn the “language” of FileMaker? We didn’t ask, but it’s an interesting question too.

Chart by music interest

Perhaps the link is not directly in the music skill, but in the ‘learning how to learn.’ To become a musician, you need to develop a skill set and understanding of a symbolic language, learn new pieces measure by measure while continuing to understand and perfect pieces as a whole. These skills may translate well in learning database development.

Favorite Composers

We asked questions about several artists and composers. This was to determine what genres of music people prefer, and we also inserted a few obscure artists as trick questions to determine the depth of knowledge in some genres. For example, Heinz Holliger (an amazing classical oboe player) was unknown by 84% of all people taking survey. Of those that do know (and like) him, all were musicians.

Chart by composer

The runaway winners that were liked or loved were The Eagles at 81%, and Igor Stravinsky at 74%. That last one really surprised me.

The most disliked by far was Kenny G at 60% dislike (but 26% who like that no-talent clown that started winning grammys. Oh wait, that’s Michael Bolton.) Overall when you include the ‘Like’ and ‘Dislike’ though, it evened out a bit.

We asked people what career they had before FileMaker, and there was certainly no consensus here. Less than 10% worked in a music related field. A career in an IT relate field seemed to be the most common, at about 18%. The list included doctors, lawyers, students, and a wide array of other fields. It made for very interesting reading.

Our science-style (yet completely unscientific) survey didn’t address a couple of things it would be really cool to know. Is the rate of musicianship higher in FileMaker developers than tech generally? What is the nature of the links people see between their musical training and their FileMaker activities?

Still, the fact that expert musicians were more likely to report expert FileMaker skills does seem to support a correlation. So, all those hours your mom made you practice the piano weren’t a waste after all, and if you’re a struggling musician, maybe you should think about a career in FileMaker to help pay the bills.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: Case study, Guest post

FileMaker Feud 2011: Round 2

September 26, 2011 by Kirk Bowman Leave a Comment

This is the second video from the first annual FileMaker Feud at the 2011 FileMaker Developer Conference. (Here is Part 1). In this video, Laura Betz and Lee Lukehart take on Perren Smith and Mark Richman to determine who advances to the final round. The crowd was warmed up so there is plenty of friendly banter with the host Dave Weisiger.

Filed Under: News Tagged With: DevCon, FileMaker Feud, Video

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