Related fields or scripts?

[Gogargirl]

I'm one of the many who think Filemaker is great precisely because you don't need to be a techie to create a dbase. But there comes a time when you know what the task is, but you can't work out the best approach....

I have a dbase with around 800-1000 records, representing people. There are 100 subsets of up to 10 records which are not constant, i.e. a person can be moved from one subset to another. From time to time, I want to view a specific subset (in form, not list, format) and to see at the same time on the layout 3 fields of information specific to each person.

All this is easy to do either with 10 relationships and 30 related fields on the layout, or with a script which finds the required subset and loops through it copying and pasting the data into 30 global fields.

But which is the best way to do it? Does one or other method work faster / make the file bigger / use more system resources?

Grateful for your thoughts!

[LiveOak]

I was following you up to "All this is easy to do". To associate groups of people, I'm not sure why you would need 10 relationships and 30 fields.

If you have a field "Group", one relationship based upon a global field with a value list will allow you to select which subset is displayed in a portal. To move someone to another group, all you need to do is change the value of the Group field for that person on the portal line, refresh the layout, and they will vanish from the currently displayed group in the portal.

-bd

[Gogargirl]

.....and I follow you completely, thanks.

What I forgot to mention (oops!) is that the related records of names need to be displayed in a circle, like round a clock. Each person's unique data (job title, firm and category) has to appear under their name.

Can't do this with portals, can I?