I have a sales order processing database where each sales order line has a number of records related to it.  The related records have several date fields and from the context of the sales order line, I need to be able to establish the latest date in each of these date fields and store it in the sales order line for use later.

 

I chose to write a custom function to which would determine the latest date in a list of dates, so I could evaluate each set of related dates in turn.  To work out the latest date in the list, I decided to turn the list of dates into numbers using the getAsNumber() function, finding the largest number in the list and converting it back to a date again using the getAsDate() function.  I then included this calculation in a script the would run through the selected order lines and evaluate the latest dates from the records

 

Now I'm in the UK, so our 'normal' date structure is dd/mm/yyyy.  When I run the script on an FMP11 Client, using a UK regionalised version of Windows 7,  the calculations  work as expected and the sales order lines end up with the correct latest dates.  If I run the same script on the server, the latest dates either end up transposed or indeterminate.   For example if the latest date is 12th March 2014, the result from running on the FMP client is 12/03/2014 whereas the result from the server is 03/12/2014  (3rd December 2014 in UK speak!).  If it were 25th March 2014, the server returns ?

 

It appears that the server doesn't respect local regional date settings and will always use the US date formats. A bit of Googling suggests that this has been an issue for other non-US users, although I can't find a solution explicitly referenced in these forums or on Technet

 

Is this the case, and does this problem persist through to FMP12 and FMP13 servers?

 

If so is there a way to reliably determine the date settings on the current platform, so it is possible to know which 'result' I am going to end up with and translate accordingly?  I'd setting for a platform independant way of doing the calculation as an alternative. 

 

Thanks

 

Brian

Perhaps this may have more to do with the config of your server OS than FMS 11 or the file itself?

 

Alternately make sure the regional settings on the file are correct as well.  You will have to open the file locally to change them.

 

See the following link regarding the File Options menu command and the Data Entry portion where it describes these settings.

 

http://www.filemaker.com/help/11/fmp/html/create_db.8.4.html