hiperlinks inside fields

[elmimmo]

Hi, I was trying at my first database, and came up with a need I do not know if is supported by Filemaker. The database is basically about bios of several people, and as such has the following fields: first name, last name, id (serial), biographical text (long).

In some of the biographies the name of other people who's own record exist in the database are named. That is why I wanted to use their names in the bio text as an hiperlink towards their own record inside the database, the same way hyperlinks work in hypertext. Some webpage addresses appear in those texts too, so a link for those pages which would open the default browser and go to that page would be desirable too.

But I do not know if that is possible, or if there would be an alternate way to accomplish a similar thing. I would appreciate a lot a little bit of help.

[Kurt Knippel]

I hope you realize that hyperlinks are rarely dynamic. They are mostly very specific words that have been setup to be linked to something else.

Most of the "dynamic" links do not even link specific words, they just link a whole block of text based on some kind of search criteria.

I am not saying that this is impossible within a database application, but I would think that this would be difficult to say the least.

Something better might be to setup a series of "cross reference" fields. Those fields could be buttons that link you via a relationship to the persons record. Simply pop the appropriate names in the fields, setup the relationships and you are ready to go.

[Vaughan]

FMP doesn't support HTML within fields (yet). But you can do something similar: create a portal to list the related records, use a script with "Go To Related Record" step.

[elmimmo]

Ouch!

My real intention was to work with all the data in filemaker, but later on use it on a MySQL server with PHP and use it on a webpage. I've seen dozens of websites that by the ammount of data they have and the way they are structured they must be using a database (instead of hardtyping everything directly in the HTML body).

In these sort of sites all records are crossreferenced by hyperlinks to other records in text.

Having in mind the final goal is a MySQL database, isn't there any way to get this on a Mac?

PS: Thanks for the answers!

[Vaughan]

If you are displaying the field contents on a web page, then sure you can do it. You'll need to enter the html into the field, just like on a web page. Then display the field in the format file using the raw option [FMP-Field: fieldname, raw]

Of course the field will look like raw html in Filemaker (which it is).

[Rigsby]

Vaughan is right – if you are familiar with HTML and want this as a web-only solution it shouldn’t be a big problem. On the other hand, the kind of “hyperlinking” from within a body of text as you want, is technically not supported by Filemaker in a normal single-user or network only senario. It can however, be done. The problem is that it is very lengthy, complicated and difficult – not really something for a beginner with FM – and to be honest, not really something for a lot of so-called experts.

Rigsby

[Kurt Knippel]

The kind of stuff that you are thinking of is basically handled by the web serving/development software and NOT by the database itself.

[elmimmo]

Ok Vaughan, but how do I hardtype html anchors inside the text of a record's field that are supposed to lead to another record? By using this means I can see external links to other pages, but no clue about internal links (from one record to another).

Rigsby, i did not really understand what is what you consider cannot be done and what can. On the other hand, I would apreciate if you expanded a little bit. I am not asking that you tell me how to do this if you do not feel like, but I'd really apreciate if at least you pointed out some of the directions you were refering to.

Anyhow, thanks for the help and interest so far B)

[elmimmo]

CaptKurt, yes, I pressumed that. I was asking about doing this in FileMaker of course.

(Or is it that I did not understand your point?)

[Kurt Knippel]

I will try to explain in seven simple words:

YOU CANNOT DO THIS WITHIN THE DATABASE

The functionality that you are looking for is handled by the HTML/CDML code that you use to build the web pages and is NOT handled within the database.

[Vaughan]

elmimmo wrote:

"Ok Vaughan, but how do I hardtype html anchors inside the text of a record's field that are supposed to lead to another record? By using this means I can see external links to other pages, but no clue about internal links (from one record to another)."

Just use standard html: <A href=""></A> but note that the links will only appear "as links" when you view the page through a web browser, and that involves custom web publishing and using the browser and not Filemaker Pro as the client.

What CaptKurt says is spot on regarding the current capabilities of the FMP client.