The other day, I was looking at a Filemaker solution for accounting called "EasyAccounting with Filemaker". I found a very interesting implementation of user interface in this solution.

They were able to dim fields, portals and buttons on the fly depending on what field or checkbox was filled. I did not know this could be done in Filemaker Pro. This is a great way to help users understand your solution and do error checking without all the dialog boxes saying, "You forgot to fill...".

At first I thought they were switching to other layouts that had the dimmed widgets, but I do not think this was done. Too many widgets on the screen would mean a separate layout for each widget. I also noticed that if I typed into a field and TAB out of it, all the other fields and widgets would dim or undim.

Second, maybe they used calculation fields for the buttons, etc. and this might have been the way they did it until I noticed a flaw in this assumption. When a button or any widget is clicked on while dimmed, no reaction is made by Filemaker. Usually some kind of cursor change or flash of the screen will occur to signify a script is being run. No script is run when the dimmed items are clicked. Scripts are only run if not dimmed.

You can download a free demo of the solution and see what I am talking about, before you guys respond. One of the layouts I had looked at was (path: Journal > Sales > Pay/Credit).

All I want to know is how do I do this for my FM files. I know how to make a button look change dynamically based off a calculation container field but do get script to to show any activity when the widget is dimmed. No darkening or script running indications. This has been a wish for a long time and I found someone doing it. Any help would be great.

Thanks

Hello Raymanj,

I'm not familiar with the EasyAccounting solution, but I have long been familiar with the techniques you're describing.

The process is based on the use of portals and calculations which selectively enable or disable the portals which contain the fields, buttons or other elements.

The best known examples of the technique are available as sample and download files from the Databasepros web site. Go to:

http://www.databasepros.com/resources.html

and search on the word 'Visibility' and all will be 'revealed'.