Hey there. I'm trying to build a BOM management system, which is proving to be difficult. Honestly, I'm not a Filemaker expert and I've never attempted something like this before.

I was thinking of having a report-style layout with sub-headers dividing layers... but I have no idea how to do something like that (if it is possible) recursive-style where "infinite" layers are possible.

Another issue was that I have nothing to determine the correct sort order with if I were to display the records by some means.

I found the following:

http://www.spf-15.com/fmExamples/

Which contained a basic BOM example where I pulled the recursive text List generator with indentation from.

This allowed me to see that the database "knows" where the parts are and on what level, but has issues using my methods to display the records in the proper hierarchy. Unfortunately, a pure text list is useless for me to generate reports with, manipulate data, or display appropriately.

Also, asking a part on an individual basis what level it is on can have issues using my poor method if it's part of a sub-assembly that is repeated else-ware in the same main assembly.

This is of because the child sums the level of the parent and then adds 1 to it, if there is more than 1 parent in the current assembly the levels are added to each other, which is wrong. However I couldn't think of another method of getting the parent(s) level dynamically. This is a calculation issue.

Do I need to know what level an object is on in order to display the full tree correctly in a report-style layout (if possible)?

Also, is it best to continue moving forward using the structure I have built and take up the other issues with the calculation and layout sections, or do I need to rethink the data structure?

I can't attach the database since it's a fmp12 file.

The layout is based off of Parts.

"I can't attach the database since it's a fmp12 file."

You CAN atttach the database; but it needs to be zipped first.