this is probably an easy one. I need to place IP addresses into a field. Can I format the field so that the numbers are entered like ###.###.###.### of course not all IP addresses have three numbers in each section so hopefully it will not ask for three numbers if there is only one. But would be nice just to get the . automatically entered. Whats the best way to do this?

If you mean that the user should enter for example "123456789" and Filemaker would automatically insert periods at the appropriate places, then no. You would need a mind-reading machine for that.

Why not split the ip address into the component octets? You could use a calculation to generate the full address from the components.

Yes thats a good idea, have done that however stuck on the calculation part. All I need to do is display the four octects with a period between each octect. Any ideas on that?

Place physical stops on the layout between the octets.

The full address should be recorded in a calculation:

IPAddress = octet1 & "." octet2 & "." & octet3 & "." & octet4

Note that the octets should be TEXT (not numbers) to make sure the string concatenation works properly.

thanks, appreciate your help.