Advcd FM Pro 5.5 Techniques for Developers

[Chuck]

For years I've had only two books on my permanent FileMaker shelf: Scriptology by John Mark Osborne and Matt Petrowsky and Special Edition Using FileMaker Pro 5 by Rich Coulombre and Jonathan Price.

Chris Moyer (who wrote the Special Edition Using FileMaker Pro 3) and Bob Bowers, both of The Moyer Group, have released a new book at the Dev Con called Advanced FileMaker Pro 5.5 Techniques for Developers which is now the third book on my permanant FileMaker shelf.

I actually just finished reading it, and it has some great information. There are some minor technical errors (nothing serious) and the scripts often have typos, but overall, this is a great book. Advanced topics covered include relational theory (and why you want to use it) custom security, advanced portals, advanced reporting, recursive data structures and complex calculations.

Although I was familiar with most of the techniques, every chapter had at least one idea that was new to me. The chapter on recursive data structures was especially useful, although I wish they had covered some more examples.

The book has a cover price of $59.95, which is pretty high. I was fortunate enough to be ad the DevCon where The Moyer Group was selling it at their booth for $39.95, but if you're working with FileMaker as much as me, then I think it would be $60 well spent.

Chuck

[falkaholic]

Heh, the only FM books I've collected are recycled now. Got one for FMP 3 and one of the "bible" seires ones. Ew.

This forum has got to be the best resource out there

[macguys]

Have you managed to make the Audit Trail solution in chapter 4 work? I've tried and tried but while the audit log entry is made, the old and new values are both set to the new values. Is it a brain/hand coordination issue on my part or was there a typo somewhere in the chapter.

[BobWeaver]

There were some problems with this mentioned by Brian Kennedy in this thread:

http://www.fmforums.com/threads/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=UBB44&Number=46535&page=0&view=collapsed&sb=5&o=93&fpart=1

He said that there were errors on the CD (or was it in the book?). You may have to carefully compare the example files on the CD to the book to find where the errors are.

[macguys]

I know that I'm missing something in the process. I've tried lots of times. Everything works well until I get to the Audit_Lookup Text = Audit_Current Text & "

[kennedy]

Sorry, its been so long since I looked at that (in lines of FMP code, not in days), that I cannot remember what the issues were in their code. There were certain things in their code that seemed broken (as I recall), and certain things that seemed inferior to other implementations of the same basic technique. Thus, although I am using essentially the same technique, my implementation is a bit different... but its working. You can pick it up as an example from the Sample Files forum... my starter template for a relational DB. I also implemented the security system from the following chapter in that book, fixing some of the errors I found in their code.

HTH.

[stevoreeno1]

Hey, I have the same problem trying to use the Audit trail technique. Did you find a solution fro this glitch? I cannot figure it out and am going nuts. I thought it may have just been me until I read your post. For the money this book cost I was hoping a few of these techniques would work.

[kennedy]

The techniques work... but the code is a bit sloppy. Have you tried their website... maybe they've posted fixes? Otherwise, pick up one of the several implementations in Sample Files.

[stevoreeno1]

I think I figured this one out. To trigger the initial lookup, you must select a field, then exit the field(clicking anywhere on the layout except in another field). From that point on, the Audit_Existing Lookup will function thus allowing this audit trail to work as illustrated in the book. They achieved this in the sample files by adding a script to a new record button which in addition to creating a new record , exits the record/request thus starting the process without the user having to go through the process of selecting a field and clicking out. If you create a new field by using the menu or keyboard shortcut, the lookup will not trigger unless the sequence of selecting a field and clicking on the layout is performed.It would have been nice if they mentioned this in the book.

[BobWeaver]

That's correct. This 'exit record' technique has been used in other examples that use this lookup trigger method, because it only works after the initial record data is saved.

[BobWeaver]

I've just finally had a look at the example on the CD and can see what the problem is. The authors have made things somewhat confusing because they have a script that writes the data from the audit trail temp field to the log file and then clears the audit trail temp field. So what you see in the audit trail temp won't correspond to what is in the log.

To make things more confusing, the navigation buttons in the example are scripted so that the Write Audit to Log file script is run whenever a button is clicked, with the exception of the View audit log button. So, when you change a record, you will see all changes that you make in the audit trail temp field, but if you click the view log button, those entries won't appear in the log unless you have used another button to navigate out of the record first.

As Kennedy says, it's kind of a sloppy implementation, but the concept is good.