Drag and drop

[Jessica C]

I have a container field to store different kinds of documents (.ppt, .xls., .doc, etc). Is there any way that I can drag a file from my desktop and put it into the container field. Then by double clicking the file icon open the file automatically?

[Fenton]

No, I don't think so. FileMaker doesn't support dragging into container fields. It would be possible to create an AppleScript droplet that called an Insert File script in FileMaker. But this is not so simple. Moreover it is not so safe, unless you were pretty careful to make sure everything was all set up ready to go. It would much safer to run the Insert from FileMaker.

[bruceR]

Filemaker DOES support drag and drop into container fields; but not from the desktop. Try dragging from other apps. For instance, while browsing here and looking at your message, I just dragged your picture into a container field.

[rocketeer]

Yes, but that's not the same thing as being able to hold aliases to files etc. in a container field which is surely what the original post was getting at? I too imagine that Applescript would be the only way to do this, and pretty horrid it would have to be with a lot of security issues too... I had to advise my client that it wasn't such a great idea, and not unreasonably they thought that they should be able to do this.

This is one of the (many) things that bug me about Filemaker. You have this set of commands and er, that's it. Something like this is not that obscure an idea, and there's no way of doing it within FMP.

Please, please correct me if I'm wrong on this! I'd happily eat a whole humble pie...

[SlimJim]

Can somebody explain to me why the necessity for container fields containing references?

I used the FMP7 Document Library template as part of my effort to understand FMP7 and used the "insert file as a reference" in that template. Eventually I realised that I would be better off simply storing the URL of a file in a text field and I deleted the container field. This had the advantage that using a directory listing in a text file I could import my entire document partition in one go (almost 6,000 records). I can open the files using a button linked to OpenURL as all the files I am interested in storing have associated applications.

I cannot see any point to a container field with a file reference and would like to be enlightened.