Using FM5 of OS X

[Bill F]

I have a networked solution at an Elementary school using Macs with systems 8.6 through 9.2. The software was built on FM 5. They are buying new computers which will have OS X installed. They are also using FM Server software which is not OS X. What problems am I looking at in keeping them in operation with my software?

[Ender]

FM 5.5 and FM 6 work fine in a mixed OS environment. When I started adding OS X clients to my school, the biggest thing I had to adjust in the databases was Page Setups. You need to add a few steps to your print scripts to choose the correct Page Setup for the platform you are running:

If [ Status(CurrentPlatform) = -1 ]

Perform Script [ Page Setup OSX Landscape 98% (All) ]

Else

Perform Script [ Page Setup OS9 Landscape 100% (All) ]

End If

Note that the scaling is sometimes a little different between OS9 and OSX.

[Vaughan]

I found that fonts changed *significantly* between 9 and X. So much so that I had to re-do all the print layouts.

Hopefully all the clients are changing over to OS X.

[Gao Ming]

I'm a novice user trying to develop a distribution database for the free magazine that I'm working on, and would appreciate some advice on adding some functionality to the db.

I've got the database showing the venues, quantities and other areas that I want, but am struggling to figure out how to make the database record changes over time. The magazine has monthly distribution, and I would like to be able to compare distribution from month to month both for total quantity and for quantity within each venue type.

Any suggestions on how to achieve this would be most appreciated. A sample of the current database is attached.

Thanks,

Gao Ming

Distribution Database.zip

[stanley]

Bill:

Apart from the font/scaling issues mentioned above (which can be kept to a minimum if you're using simple fonts like Helvetica) you should have few problems. I've got clients running FM Server 5 on Mac OS 8.6, with users on anything from 8.6 to 9.2, various versions of OSX & Windows from 98 to the present, and there is very little to complain about as far as the server is concerned. The real problems, as the other guys said, come in the form of how each platform handles fonts, layouts & printing.

-Stanley

[Bill F]

To all who replied to my query: Thank you very much. The interest and helpfullness of those using this forum is simply out-standing. As I understand what you all are pretty much were saying is: "You probably won't have much difficutly, but then again you might - so wait and see what happens." Well, I can live with that - that's really pretty normal isn't it?

Thanks again

Bill F

FileMaker Version: 5

Platform: Windows XP