i'm trying to create a student database for a nonprofit. i started out using the student records template that comes with fm7. in addition to the layouts already present, i created two more - one one called 'student attendance' and the other 'all students attendance'

my first question is:

when i click on create new record on the student records layout, it creates one and automatically inserts a serial number. how do i make fm also automatically create a record in the second layout (attendance) that also contains the same serial number?

why not just put the attendance information on the first layout you ask? ideally on the attendance layout, i would like to have one line per week, something like...

week # | sun | mon | tues | etc

the page will eventually get pretty big, which this leads me to my second question:

the class is ongoing so i can't just, for example, create 10 lines and be done. so how do i get it to insert a new line automatically each week?

any ideas or suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Filemaker comes with a tutorial and example files that show you how to create portals and related records. Master the tutorial and then come back with questions.

What you are going to need is a new table to store your attendance data. I would use one record to store the data for one student on one day. This means many records for each student. You will have to write a script to create these records, maybe a week's worth at a time.