Chong-Yee

Have a look at this document, just published by 360Works - http://360works.com/articles/detail/208

Dear Mr Decorte, Thank you very much for your helpful reply. It answers my questions and provides some good insight as well. We use SuperContainer at the moment and are quite happy with it; I was just wondering if (and to what extent) external container fields can replace SuperContainer. I am aware that 360Works has just yesterday posted a comparison table. Regards, Chong-Yee

Thanks very much for the update, Scott. I'm on 11 at the moment and until the problems with speed with 12 are resolved, unlikely to upgrade. But it's useful to know that the ExecuteSQL script step woks somewhat differently from the plugins.

This is not meant to be a scientific test, but I did some measuring last night on a solution converted into FM12. Mac OS X Lion, 8 Gb memory, SSD, local file, FileMaker Pro 12 Advanced, Pre-Release. 7000 record list view, scroll to top of list, position mouse at bottom of scroll bar and hold down until last record appears. FM11: 29 seconds FM12 (same solution, converted): 50 seconds On my machine, at least, there seems to be a significant slow-down in scrolling rates for this particular list view from FM11 to FM12. I acknowledge a possible effect from the fact that I was using the Pre-Release version. Regards, Chong-Yee

On a hosted FM12 database, it does not appear possible to have the storage location be on a connected hard disk, e.g., a FireWire volume. e.g., when the "Base Directories" in "Manage Containers" is set to "/Volumes/ExternalHD/FolderName/" on a local FM12 file, this works fine and the files are stored in the expected location. When the same file is uploaded to Server, however, the path appears to be treated as relative to the [hosted location] FileMaker documentation is (deliberately?) ambiguous - from Q&A at http://help.filemaker.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/10244/kw/opening%20files%20in%20container%20fields "Can external storage be located on different drives? Yes, this includes mounted volumes." and then a couple of lines below: "Are containers with external storage supported when hosted via FileMaker Server? Yes, when a file is added to a container field that is configured for external storage, the files are automatically transferred to the server machine. A directory is created next to the database file within the "Databases" folder within the "FileMaker Server" directory." Can someone please confirm that this is the expected behaviour? If so, then it is a little annoying. Regards, Chong-Yee

Does anyone know whether the FileMaker XML processor supports XInclude?

It might even be a code library licensed from Microsoft, which would explain the Rosetta dependence.

Export to Excel does work in Lion (we use it daily), but you have to export to the newer .xlsx format. As the dialog box says, FileMaker cannot export to .xls format as that would require Rosetta (amazing but true - I don't understand how the fact Excel 2008 needs Rosetta should influence FileMaker's exporting capabilities, but there must be a technical reason for this).

Hi, Rick, I've just spent the last couple of weekends getting my head around XML and FileMaker's export grammar. It looks very daunting at first, so I feel your pain. In fact, it took me over four years to get around this fear (it is a problem that we have had for that long). I am still very much a novice at XML, but having now got over that hurdle, I must say that it is not as bad as it seems. There is a logic to it. You have to write an XSLT stylesheet and tell FileMaker to apply this stylesheet to the XML it exports. The XML that comes out will be in a row/column format, with the names of the corresponding fields listed towards the top of the XML. You will need to understand the structure of the XML the revenue expects (I find actual examples of expected XML to be more useful than dry documentation), and get the stylesheet to write out the bits of the structure, interspersed with the data from the exported XML file, using <xsl:value-of select="fmp:COL[2]/fmp:DATA" /> etc. I found the chapter in my "Special Edition: Using FileMaker 9" book (published by Que) to be particularly helpful. There is a detailed walkthrough both of importing and exporting data. I suggest you either get a copy or try to borrow it from a library. The other material I have found useful is "XML in a Nutshell", published by O'Reilly, which I am currently reading. Hope this helps. Good luck! Regards, Chong-Yee

Thank you very much for this, Ralph!

It's not free, but the 6Barcode plugin works well, is reasonably priced and simple to use. Output is a PNG so it doesn't require any fonts but Code 128 only, though. http://sixfriedrice.com/wp/products/6barcode/ A satisfied user,

Hi, Everyone, Is there any way to use FileMaker's Internal SQL on a solution, where the names of the fields contain spaces? Statements like: SELECT Last Name from People WHERE Team Role = 'Judge' or even SELECT zzID from People WHERE Last Name = 'Tan' fails spectacularly - I think because the SELECT clause expects a comma delimited list of field names. Here, the field names in my solution use spaces (for legibility - and FM does not complain when I do that). I have tried SELECT 'Last Name' but that only gives the literal in every row. The FM ODBC/JDBC Guide is not much help. All it says on page 47 (Field Names) is "The most common expression is a simple field name, such as calc or Sales_Data.Invoice_ID." (thanks!) It should't make any difference, but I am using the BaseElement plugin 1.2.1 to send the query to FileMaker. Any help would be gratefully appreciated. Thank you in advance. Regards, Chong-Yee

Sorry for the bother, but I'm a first time user of SuperContainer having trouble with installing it. I hope someone in these forums can help. I've recently upgraded to Server 11 Advanced and have downloaded the latest SuperContainer (2.742). Ran Installer.jar from the local hard disk (not network drive). Message says "An unexpected error occurred during installation". I then followed the instructions for manual installation, and SuperContainer appears to run, but only in Demo Mode. There wasn't any opportunity to enter the registration code (presumably this would have been part of the aborted installation process). What may be relevant is that I seem to remember installing a demo version of SuperContainer some months back (the button on the Installer screen says "Upgrade", which seems to confirm this). Clicking "Remove" gives the same "unexpected error" message. Can someone help please? Regards, Chong-Yee P.S. I should have added that restarting doesn't seem to help.