Hilite and Similar

[Shelley]

Hi to everyone out there!

On looking through some of the templates supplied with filemaker 7 so as to get some ideas about fields and relationships, I have noticed several instances of fields starting with Hilite or Similars, please can someone explain what these mean as I can find no help in the help index at all.

Thank you very much

Shelley

[SteveB]

I don't know what similars are since I never look at the templates, but hilites generally refer to the following: They typically are calculations and return their results as 'containers'. They are used to highlight records, such as a selected row in a portal or after a find. Look at the field and see if it is a calc and what you think it is doing. If you're confused, paste the calc back to this thread and we'll explain.

Steve

[Shelley]

Hi Steve

Thank you for your reply.

Here is what the field says. In case you are wondering I am an IT Trainer with experience of Access and have trained Filemaker at a basic level. I really like filemaker and am trying to build up my knowledge in order to use and train the package.

Case(HiliteSortedBy = "eventA"; GetRepetition(HiliteLibrary; 1);

HiliteSortedBy = "eventD"; GetRepetition(HiliteLibrary; 2);

"")

In the field definition box it shows the field as "unstored ". I would love to know what that means too. I have attached a picture.

Thank you very much for your interest.

Shelley

[SteveB]

Shelley: Filemaker requires a totally different mindset from Access, and is really easy to use.

Unstored versus stored: Unstored means don't store the results of a calculation, but recalculate when needed. For example when a unstored calc appears on a layout that the user is viewing, FM will calculate at that time.

One of the best uses for (global) repetition fields is to store graphic elements, and then pick them based on a calc criteria. Your example says use the color (or graphic) in Repetition 1 if HiliteSortedBy=EventA, if EventD use

Repetition 2. If Rep 1 has a graphic color of gray, and Rep 2 has green, you should be able to figure out what's going on. Display Hilite Library on a layout, right click on the Format Field and display all of the Repetitions. You'll see the graphics.

Steve

[Fenton]

In the case of the Hilite, that you see a great deal of in some of FileMaker's templates, it's used to produce the little up and down triangles next to the field labels in List view layouts, to show which field the records are being sorted by, and the direction of the sort.

It took 3 scripts to do this in FileMaker 6 (it could have been done with 2, but 3 is less hassle), because you could only have 1 Sort step directly in a script. So, one ascending, one descending, and one to "toggle," doing ascending by default (if not sorted by that field), then toggle between the two Sorts once sorted by that field.

The setting of the Hilite field to little bits of text is just to keep track of what field the records are sorted by, and in which direction.

The triangles themselves are 2 objects in a global field, with 2 repetitions. Then each sortable field has its own calculated container field.

It's clever, but takes up a lot of room in the fields and scripts. In FileMaker 7 however, it can all be done with the one "toggle" script, as multiple Sort steps are allowed (and definable) within one script. Much neater. Actually all the various "field" scripts could be condensed to just 1 script, as only 1 field can be shown as sorted at any one time.

Ha! I just looked at a couple of their v.7 templates, and they were NOT optimized for version 7. I did the optimization on a file of mine which had this earlier method. It was worth it to knock many 3 scripts sets down to 1 each.

Their Photo Catalog file also is not optimized. It has 16 scripts, where only 1, with a simple number parameter would do. Makes no difference to how it works, but it's so easy to do; one wonders what kind of example this sets :-|

One other caveat is that every window can have its own sort order in version 7, so might require its own set of Highlite scripts, and marking fields (could share the containers). Unless you include the layout-window in the script, and only show sort icons in the current window, or do each window-field separately within the "one" script. You'd have to rename all sortable windows to a known name and control navigation. Doable, but yikes!

I would kill for 1 level of folders in fields and scripts.