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FileMaker Magazine

A blog by FileMaker Magazine in Affiliate Blogs

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Entries in this blog

FileMaker REST using BaseElements Plugin

REST (Representational state transfer) has quickly become the de facto standard for communication between services and apps. Before it, came SOAP and XMLRPC, but the two buzzwords you’ll hear over and over these days are REST and JSON. When it comes to FileMaker, you’ve always been able to do super basic REST with the Insert from URL script step. Later down the road, FileMaker added in support for the POST method of service interaction with the httpspost:// url scheme. While the basics are alw

List View Record Jumping

When developing your solutions for users, you can’t always account for how easy they think things should work. You do your best, but without user testing, they’re essentially stuck with what you initially create. You can, however, put in features which you think will make usability more convenient for them. Many times, these convenience features can be a bit complicated to implement. Fortunately, with more recent versions of FileMaker, the task of adding in such features has become much easier.

Capturing data with Google Forms

One of FileMaker’s best advantages is its ability to quickly provide an interface to common data tasks. Sorting, filtering and analysis, via automated routines, make a database system better suited to routine tasks. Primarily, because you can control the user interface. Typically, spreadsheet users don’t think in terms of disjointed data. Boiling data down into a relational model is something which takes a bit of patience and know-how. Data collection, however, is easily done within a spreadshe

Dynamic Record Tagging

One of the best parts of developing within FileMaker Pro is that you don’t need to create every single thing from scratch. For example, having a Popover widget at the ready for immediate use in any layout is a really big benefit. It’s an automatic space saver. However, what FileMaker doesn’t have built-in are certain features you might expect in most modern day software. How about a tagging feature which allows users to tag records and find those records on demand. This is something which isn’

Product Review of FMPerception

FileMaker Database analysis has been around since the days when FileMaker made its meta data available through its Database Design Report - or DDR for short. The report, for as long as I can recall, has been available in the human readable HTML format and also in the machine language format of XML. Various developers have always made use of this verbose collection of tidbits about a database, but none have made it as fast as FMPerception. This newly released database analysis tool is the faste

Developer Time Savers

When you’re in the “zone” while developing, it feels really good to get stuff done. You feel like you’re “flow”-ing through the problems and simply knocking them out one by one. That feeling which comes from achieving “flow” is often hard to have when you hit situations where you feel like you’re being hindered by the environment or a lack of knowledge. Having to stop for research or fumbling through the development environment is one of those necessary evils. It’s the learning part that takes

(Re)Theming Solutions

As FileMaker Inc adds new features and functionality to FileMaker, it’s really easy for older projects to start to feel like they’re aging pretty quickly. Fortunately, one of the easiest fixes to make is to give things a brand new look and feel. The process, however, of going about a re-theming isn’t always as easy as it seems. You’ve got new layout objects which may have been added and there are a ton of “older tricks” which may be replaced with newer ways of doing things. Without going down

Native Responsive Text Objects

Nothing screams responsive more than text which grows or shrinks based on the device upon which it’s being viewed. The sad part of the previous statement is that FileMaker does not provide a native way of doing this. There’s no Conditional Formatting which says when Get ( WindowContentWidth ) > 768 scale the font size by 120%. There is, however, a quaint little trick you can do with a few of FileMaker’s native functions along with a powerful Custom Function named CustomList. When you know ho

Using Utility Scripts

Learning how to efficiently create scripts within FileMaker is a never ending process. It's a balance of leveraging what you know and mixing in newly added features along with new ways of doing things. Optimization and cleanup will always be part of the ever growing software solution. In this video, I present the topic of using utility scripts in order to save precious development time. You know, those reusable scripts which prevent you from writing unique and dedicated scripts for every possib

FileMaker 15 Released

FileMaker 15 was released on May 10th 2016 and includes a few key new technologies. While much of the focus was on the mobile end of things, there are some speed improvements along with some convenience features which will make working in FileMaker 15 just a bit more enjoyable! You can Watch the HD version on YouTube FileMaker Inc. released version 15 on May 10th. Did you miss the news? If so, then here’s a video which goes through the shortlist of new features. One of the biggest changes wa

iOS Drill Down Sliders

As software users become more and more familiar with various UX methods, it becomes more and more desirable to emulate those methods within your FileMaker solutions. Common patterns such as tab panels and scrolling lists are a piece of cake and native to FileMaker. Some of the more recent implementations are simple and super easy, like Popovers for example. However, other implementations can be a bit complex and require those ever necessary bits of deep knowledge about how FileMaker works behin

Performance Review

When your average knowledge worker starts developing with FileMaker Pro, there’s a lot of background and history which may be missing. Especially, when it comes to making certain decisions about schema. We’ve all been at that level at some point in the learning curve, and the process of reworking things is just par for the course. The FileMaker environment makes it so easy to simply add a new calculated value. It’s even part of our mental processing. “Oh, I need to calculate this.” The problem

Hide Calculation Coolness

One of the best new features added to version 13 of FileMaker was the Hide Calculation. Not only does it allow you to hide any layout element as needed, but it provides access to the calc engine for creating any $local or $$GLOBAL variables on a layout-by-layout basis. Knowing that all layout elements pass through the hide calculation before being rendered to the user is also a helpful thing to know. In this video, I’ll walk you through the process of using the Hide calculation in order to make

Button Bar Tricks

No Access? Watch the preview video here. ButtonBarTricks_Pre.mp4 Attachment Size ButtonBarTricks.zip 372.35 KB By Matt Petrowsky When developing within tools like Xcode, the sky’s the limit in terms of providing user interaction and user feedback. Fortunately, with FileMaker, we have access to many of the core interaction elements from iOS. Popovers are a great example of a critical iOS UI element. When FileMaker 13 was released we got the wonderful Popover objects. To follo

Button Bar Tricks

When developing within tools like Xcode, the sky’s the limit in terms of providing user interaction and user feedback. Fortunately, with FileMaker, we have access to many of the core interaction elements from iOS. Popovers are a great example of a critical iOS UI element. When FileMaker 13 was released we got the wonderful Popover objects. To follow that up within FileMaker 14, we got the new objects named Button Bars. These new objects were an enhancement on the ages old Button objects. The co

Web Scraping Data

Attachment Size WebScrapingData.zip 383.66 KB By Matt Petrowsky FileMaker can be such a wonderful desktop tool for harvesting and managing a lot of data. It’s because the user interface is baked right there into the backend database. You can whip up a powerful data parsing solution in no time. Can it handle the data? Yep! Can you build the interface right there? Yep! This sense of “data power” can be compounded even more with a little bit of know-how. When you’re not afraid to ste

Web Scraping Data

FileMaker can be such a wonderful desktop tool for harvesting and managing a lot of data. It’s because the user interface is baked right there into the backend database. You can whip up a powerful data parsing solution in no time. Can it handle the data? Yep! Can you build the interface right there? Yep! This sense of “data power” can be compounded even more with a little bit of know-how. When you’re not afraid to step, just a bit, outside of FileMaker’s user interface and simply plug-in to ano

Slideout Menus

No Access? Watch the preview video here. SlideoutMenus_Pre.mp4 Attachment Size SlideoutMenus.zip 322.33 KB By Matt Petrowsky Slideout menus have been around for quite some time in the mobile world. They often come alongside an icon of three short horizontal bars which are commonly called a hamburger menu. Called as such because it looks like two buns, with one above and one below the meat in between. This icon is also suspiciously similar to a "List view" icon in our familiar

Slideout Menus

Slideout menus have been around for quite some time in the mobile world. They often come alongside an icon of three short horizontal bars which are commonly called a hamburger menu. Called as such because it looks like two buns, with one above and one below the meat in between. This icon is also suspiciously similar to a "List view" icon in our familiar world of FileMaker. While the UI pattern still has a lot of use in the mobile world, it's becoming increasingly "out of fashion" and referred t

Securing Service Credentials

No Access? Watch the preview video here. SecuringCredentials_Pre.mp4 Attachment Size SecuringServiceCredentials.zip 381.86 KB By Matt Petrowsky Security credentials, such as critical passwords, API secret keys and other methods of authentication are the gatekeepers to vast troves of data. These are the pieces of information you want to be most careful with. You don't want to spread them all throughout your FileMaker solution making the "attack surface" an easy steal for anyo

Securing Service Credentials

Security credentials, such as critical passwords, API secret keys and other methods of authentication are the gatekeepers to vast troves of data. These are the pieces of information you want to be most careful with. You don't want to spread them all throughout your FileMaker solution making the "attack surface" an easy steal for anyone. In this video you'll learn about how the Full Access settings apply to both custom functions and how this relates to scripts which reference those custom funct

Creative Slider Panels

Attachment Size CreativeSliderPanels.zip 350.22 KB By Matt Petrowsky Emulating features and design functionality found within iOS apps can be both frustrating and rewarding in FileMaker. Frustrating because you can't just replicate anything you see in iOS, yet rewarding when you pull something off and feel like FileMaker is that much closer to a native looking application. The biggest benefit with FileMaker being you likely created the solution with a speed which simply can't be ha

Creative Slider Panels

Emulating features and design functionality found within iOS apps can be both frustrating and rewarding in FileMaker. Frustrating because you can't just replicate anything you see in iOS, yet rewarding when you pull something off and feel like FileMaker is that much closer to a native looking application. The biggest benefit with FileMaker being you likely created the solution with a speed which simply can't be had when building the same with the native iOS APIs. Simply put, FileMaker saves a t

Practical Layout Design Tips

No Access? Watch the preview video here. LayoutDesignTips_Pre.mp4 By Matt Petrowsky When it comes to creating a great design within FileMaker's layout mode, there's always a bit of skill and experience mixed in with some practical know-how. Fortunately, the creative side of the experience can be enhanced quite a bit when you know how to apply those practical bits of knowledge. If you've always wondered how the masters achieve their streamlined and balanced look and feel, then wonder

Practical Layout Design Tips

When it comes to creating a great design within FileMaker's layout mode, there's always a bit of skill and experience mixed in with some practical know-how. Fortunately, the creative side of the experience can be enhanced quite a bit when you know how to apply those practical bits of knowledge. If you've always wondered how the masters achieve their streamlined and balanced look and feel, then wonder no more. This video will showcase how to use FileMaker's grid and word processing features in

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