Using a button to activate a container field?

[TFM]

Hello,

I have a container field DB that holds items like Webpages, word doc files, sounds and pictures.

I'd like to be able to make a button that will automatically launch the proper program for each type. I can't see a way to do this yet. And double clicking on the field can have odd effects. As an example. The word file opens IN FMP and attempts to edit it directly! Not good.

However, if I right click on it and select open it opens in word and allows editing and saving. This is perfect but my users get confused having to do this. Hence the bright shiny click me button to open it up.

Any ideas?

Thanks

[RussBaker]

Scripting a Button which:

Go To Field [your container field][select/Perform]

should do it.

[TFM]

The above works great for pictures and other items.

Unfortantly it doesn't work well for .html's where IE is already open and for some stupid reason, it does doesn't work with .doc files with word.

All of the others default to acttivate package except the doc file. It defaults to EDIT package. This makes the word doc OPEN in the container field. (Way to small to be of use)

Is there anyway to fix this?

Also, while trying to figure this out I started playing around with the EDIT -> Object options.

When the container field is selected and you pick this EDIT -> Object it gives you some further options related to the package in the container field.

For .doc files there was the Convert option. I tried it out. But now it converts everything to word pictures and you can't get it back! Ugg.. The option to leave it as a doc file and not convert is blank. When you click on the blank entry it causes Filemaker (or the runtime) to CRASH with no errors. (It just disapears). Is there anyway to fix this or do I have to redo windows? Ugg

Thanks

[TFM]

Update:

Thankfuly I'm on XP Pro and was able to use a Restore Point. That fixed the issue. From what I can tell there seems to be a bug? that corupts the package entries in the registry... Nasty...

Of course, I still have the issue with the word documents EDITING instead of opening. Sigh. Nightmare.

TFM

[TFM]

Further Update:

It appears that if the file is displayed as an icon instead of the first bits of text it launchs Word. But if it's showing text of the file it opens it in the container field.

I can create a NEW word document with a button that appears as an icon and allows editing.

I can also add a document as an icon to a container but it has to have it's path and name hard coded into the script.

So far I cannot find any way to allow dragging or loading in a word document to a container that will appear as an icon so that it can be properly launched instead of edited in the container field.

[kenneth2k1]

Hi:

Most Windows programs support OLE (Object Linking and Embedding)- such as FM, MS Office programs, Visio, etc. When you put an object in a container field, it becomes embedded. That is why when you click on it, it opens in the container space (this does not happen on MacOS because you cannot edit embedded objects).

If it is a Word document, try right-clicking on the container field and select Open Document.

Ken

[TFM]

Hi, ya, that works, but I'm trying to do that via a script.