File conversion frm 6 to 8

[kenseye]

In the older version of FMP, I had individual files that I opened andclose with scripts as needed. In FMP8 the opening process appears very slow when clicking on a record in a portal and opening that record. Can I restructure the file and data to be a table within the new FMP8 file? Or, how do I get quicker access to records in another file?

[Ender]

I'm surprised that you're experiencing slower speed opening files. In our experience, FM7/8 is much faster opening files. Perhaps you have some old File References slowing things down (read the FM8 Migration tech brief, or search the forums for +File +References for more details about how to fix them upon conversion.)

In any case, Yes you can combine files, but it will take some work. In FM8 Advanced, you can Import tables from other files within the Table definition dialog. Once the tables are in the local file, the local table occurances can be redefined to use the local tables, layouts can be re-created, and scripts can be imported.

If you're going through all that work anyway, it may be better to rewrite the structure of the solution from scratch. With this, you can still reuse some or all of the old layouts, but many of the old scripts won't be needed any more. The reason this might be better is because complex files that were created in previous versions often have a lot of stuff that's not needed anymore, like concatonated keys and various lookups. Usually the number of fields can be reduced by a third or by half just by removing this detritus. But rewriting also gives you the opportunity to normalize and fix things that have been ignored or done poorly in the past.

Edited May 25, 2006 by Guest

[gdurniak]

Check each file. Most likely, many left over paths in each File Reference are slowing things down

If all your files are hosted from the same folder (as most are), then you can use just the very last "relative" reference in each file reference, e.g. "file:contacts.fp7"

no real need to combine files

Edited May 26, 2006 by Guest

[kenseye]

I ended up redoing my file references and that sped things up. Redoing file references can create all sorts of broken links and I'm fixing them as I go. thanks

[Ender]

It's useful to note: for a large/complex solution, Metadata Magic from New Millennium has a File Reference fixer that consolidates and cleans up file references in FM5/6 files. This is an excellent pre-conversion time saver.