Newbie thinks filemaker is frustrating

[macdiva]

Hi,

I am a newbie to filemaker pro and I would appreciate

some advice. I really wanted to learn the software and

even hired a friend to teach me but his knowledge was

not thorough enough. I have gone through

quicktoolkit.net and was very interested in getting

the software to set up my system but was afraid of the

learning curve. I have bought the filemaker bible 4

months ago and I could not even put up a proper system

at all which they say it was easy.

Please help.... I would appreciate if anyone at all

can tell me where I can learn this but prefer somewhere most

preferbly in Singapore or Thailand or even Hong Kong.

Thank you.

Best Regards

Lilian

[Peterh]

Hi Lilian,

I found the book "Special Edition using FileMaker Pro 5" by Rich Coulombre and Jonathan Price very useful. It goes into a lot of depth, but is quite readable. It also provides good information on setting up your database.

Otherwise I suggest just making a start on what you need to do, and coming back to this forum when you hit a snag. That is how I have learnt FileMaker. When you can't do a particular task in FM, searching through these lists is also very useful.

Cheers, Peter.

[TWillson]

Lilian,

I am not a database programmer by trade and had limited experience with Microsoft Access before switching to Filemaker a short time ago. Many of the somewhat easy tasks I was struggeling with in Access and trying to learn VBA (with no programming experience) have been accomplished much easier with Filemaker with a much shorter learning curve. I definitely agree with Peter, these forums are a huge help. You may want to spend some time just reading through posts to get an idea of the possiblities, tips and tricks. What has also helped me is to download sample databases and just spending time figuring out how they work i.e use of scripts, calculations, portals etc. I also suggest another book which has been a big help to me and I know other have recommended this as well: "Advanced FileMaker Pro 5.5 Techniques for Developers" by Chris Moyer and Bob Bowers.

Hope this helps,

Tom

[Mark Appleby]

Lillian,

Try macacademy they have cds which play presentations, they are the best piece of computer training I have ever seen. And they cover Filemaker! They take you from the very basics to an advanced leveel in no time. You will be able to write simple databases even if you have no previous experience of them within a couple of days. I would give them 5 stars.

Mark

[falkaholic]

FileMaker is easy to learn. It gets frustrating later, when you start hitting its limitations on a daily basis.