airbaal

Thanks for the replies. I still can't get it to work after reading the FileMaker tech article. I created a field called Description. In the description I have (quotes are part of the field) "This is just a test." To test this, I then have a calculation that is "calculate only when needed." For the calculation I have: Substitute(description,"""","") However, it still displays: "This is just a test." Any ideas? This is driving me crazy.... Thanks

I figured it out... well, I know what the problem is now. It turns out I have the "use smart quotes" feature on, so the substitute for the " does not work because it is not really a " and is instead a smart quote.

If a user has a quotation mark (") in a field and I want to remove it, how do I go about doing this? I tried: code: Replace(description,""","") which would obviously replace any quotations in the field with nothing, but this does not work. An example would be: Description field: "This is driving me nuts" I would want it to be: This is driving me nuts Is there any way to do this? Thanks, Eric

I gotta agree with Maerix and his complaints about this one. And it's not just because I've been going back and forth with him trying to get both of our projects from crashing. I think FileMaker has SOMETHING wrong with it: not sure what, but something. FileMaker told him his FileMaker files were corrupt. If that were the case, one would assume the database files would not matter if they were run on a PC or a Mac. Well, him & I experienced problems ONLY on a PC. Ran PERFECTLY on a Mac. So there has to be something to that. As far as limitations, it really sounds like there are some to it. Granted, if you are an experienced FMaker user, you can easily get around them by breaking files up, etc. I don't know about you guys, but I first started using FileMaker building my project. And I've grown and learned about it as the popularity of my solution has grown, causing me to add to it. Unfortunately, rewriting and splitting up my project is not as easy as copying and pasting code to another file, unless somebody has a way to copy fields & layouts easily. For people like us who started learning & writing databases at the same time, we are in an unfortunate position. I am going to start a rewrite of one of my apps down the line, and unfortunately, FileMaker is not going to be used. I am playing around with Visual Basic, ActiveX Direct Objects, and Microsoft's Jet engine (access files). I love the speed of development in FMaker, but you lose raw power. The unability to run a script when you leave a field, tabbing to buttons, customized shortcut keys (besides leaving stuff in Scripts), inability to really communicate with other Windows programs, and the poor method of upgrading multiple databases at once is a big turnoff when you are trying to sell a "professional" package. It's funny, FileMaker has been around forever. You would think they would address a few of these issues. My frustrated $.02. :-) Eric

Trust me, I blame Windows & Microsoft whenever possible :-) But this problem happens just as often in Windows 98 & 98 SE with updated printer drivers. I am more frustrated then anything. It previews fine, but does not print and instead crashes. You reboot, then it runs fine for a while, then crashes. I've redesigned the layout from scratch, and still no luck. And when I think the problem is fixed, all the sudden it starts coming up again. Frustrating, to say the least... Eric

Thanks for the reply. I just talked to a client today and he is having problems printing a SIMPLE printout which is basically two one-line calculated fields in the body of the layout. The computer just completely freezes up, on Windows ME. Even after downloading new printer drivers for his HP. Other people get that page fault error I mentioned in my previous post, while others freeze. It's funny how the ONLY thing different in my code is the Preview or Print[] command. It doesn't hang on Previewing, only Printing. It makes me feel like my solution sucks, but it is FileMaker and not me. I swear :-) Any one with any ideas? This is starting to be a killer of a problem. Thanks, Eric

Many of my clients have been having a major problem with FileMaker Pro 5.0v1 & v3 on the Windows platform and I hope somebody can help. I have a printout that has a sliding text field in the body of the printout, and it is set to remove the blank spaces if the whole box is not filled with text. There can be anywhere from 40-200 records in the body of the printout, so this sliding text field essentially has to be processed 40-200 times. My clients can preview the information just fine, but when they go to print, sometimes an error occurs:

From what I have seen and experience, FileMaker is somewhat limiting with interacting with other programs. You cannot make a call to a database from another program, which makes things difficult. I have heard that their ODBC support is somewhat limited and could be better. Overall, I really like FileMaker though. However, I am going to rewrite one of my databases in VB so I can use it directly with other Windows apps. If you just want a database, use FMaker, otherwise, VB or even Access may be a better way... Just my thoughts... -Eric

quote: Originally posted by bobbyq: Can I get filemaker to create bar-codes from zip codes (or other numbers)? FileMaker will print barcodes of any type. You just need to get a font that does the barcoding and use that barcode on your label layout in your database. Here are a few links to barcoding companies: http://www.elfring.com/ http://www.azalea.com/ You could make a barcode font too if you have Fontographer, a list of what each number looks like in its barcode form, and a scanner. But buying one from one of those companies above is probably easier :-). -Eric