Archive for the 'FileMaker' Category

Page 3 of 12

I’m just a stupid developer, don’t confuse me… part 2 of 3

Published on April 28, 2011. 2 Comments

See part 1 of this series where I briefly discussed leaving yourself and others clues about the “why” of your design decisions.

The second principle I want to talk about helps with the “how” and “what”.

It can scarcely be denied that the supreme goal of all theory is to make the irreducible basic elements as simple and as few as possible without having to surrender the adequate representation of a single datum of experience.
- Albert Einstein

Or how it’s more often paraphrased:

Make things as simple as possible, but not simpler.

Take the time to make things simpler. This is much more about the “how” and “what” of programming.

Continue reading ‘I’m just a stupid developer, don’t confuse me… part 2 of 3′

 
Published in FileMaker by Chad Sager. Tags: Tags: , , , , , , .

I’m just a stupid developer, don’t confuse me… part 1 of 3

Published on April 27, 2011. 0 Comments

Our human brain has the amazing capacity to remember and understand the things we do. What’s more amazing is our brain’s capacity to overestimate how much it has the ability remember and understand the things we do. My average shelf life for remembering how my code works is about two months. That is to say if I don’t touch a part of an application for up to two months, I can jump in and get back to work, no problem. After that I have to study it a bit and get my bearings again. The longer I go the worse it gets. Your mileage may vary, but no one can escape this problem.

There are a few things that have helped me minimize the pain described above, which I’ll be posting about over the next couple of days.

Continue reading ‘I’m just a stupid developer, don’t confuse me… part 1 of 3′

 
Published in FileMaker by Chad Sager. Tags: Tags: , , , , , , , .

FileMaker Go now supports Charts, Printing and Signatures!

Published on April 20, 2011. 0 Comments

FileMaker Go for iPad/iPhone Updated

What’s New in Version 1.2.1
- Adds support for FileMaker Charts (compatible with FileMaker Pro 11).
- Records and saves signatures to the database file.
- Adds support for printing.
- Improves rendering, display, and printing of PDFs.
- Sends notification to user when there is a record lock conflict.
- Adds ability to open hidden files.
- Resolves compatibility issues when running on iPad.

Update:
Check out the “FileMaker Go 1.2 In Two Minutes”

 
Published in FileMaker and FileMaker Go by Chad Sager. Tags: Tags: , .

We can Sort it out

Published on March 30, 2011. 0 Comments

The other day I was sitting with a client, looking at a list view layout.  The client said to me, “Can you make it so that when I click the headers the columns will sort, like in Table View or Excel?”  No problem, I said; I’ll just make each header a button that runs a Sort script step.  They she said “Well, when I click each one it should sort ascending and then descending, just like Excel.”  Ok – a little bit more inconvenient; I need to use a script and a bunch of of fields to keep track of ascending/descending.  Finally, she dropped the bomb.  “Oh, can I have those cute little up and down arrows, like in Excel?”  That is the last straw, I thought.  Now I have to make scripts, fields AND graphic calculations for those dumb arrows.

There must be a better way to do this.  Using the great scientific tradition of standing on the shoulders of giants I searched the web for good solutions.  Using  a combination of scripting and merge global variables you can easily put up and down arrows next to sorted headers.  This technique only requires a script.  No extra fields are required go make it work.

Continue reading ‘We can Sort it out’

 
Published in FileMaker and Tips and tricks by Jerry Salem. Tags: Tags: , .

March Meeting Cancelled; Jesse Barnum and John Sindelar in April

Published on March 15, 2011. 0 Comments

We’re cancelling the March meeting. Technically we already had one anyway.

As compensation, I’m happy to say that in April, we’ll be hosting John Sindelar of SeedCode and Jesse Barnum of 360Works. Save the date: April 26th.

John and Jesse will be mainly talking about Zulu and DocuBin.

Zulu

Zulu is an extension for FileMaker Server that integrates FileMaker, iCal, Google Calendar and mobile devices. The key feature with this is that iCal acts as a FileMaker client. Don’t think sync – think synchronicity. It’s cool. Zulu is a collaborative effort between SeedCode and 360Works, two rock-solid names in the field.

DocuBin

DocuBin is a comprehensive document management tool built on top of 360Works’ SuperContainer plugin. DocuBin is a product of 360Works.

We’ll let you know more as the date approaches and as I know more.

In the meantime, some links:

Zulu: http://www.seedcode.com/cp-app/ste_cat/zulu
SeedCode: http://www.seedcode.com/
360Works: http://www.360works.com/

 
Published in FileMaker and Meeting Announcements by Colin Keefe. Tags: Tags: , , , .

Use “Set Window Title” Script Step to Give Users Feedback on What They’re Waiting For

Published on February 7, 2011. 1 Comment

Problem: Users are waiting for your FileMaker solution to perform an action, but it takes a long time.

How to help ease the pain: Use “Set Window Title” script step to give them feedback.

FileMaker has no built in progress indicator, so whether your scripted processes take 10 seconds or 10 minutes, your users might not know what’s going on. You can create layouts or pop-up windows to tell them “Hang on, I’m working on something,” but it’s hard to give them live feedback. If you’re jumping around to different contexts and doing other things, you usually use a “Freeze Window” script step to hide the ugly guts of the system from the user. So to update information for the user, you have to return to the status layout and refresh or re-freeze the window.

As a developer, that adds a lot of work for you. That’s time you could be spending on making your processes faster, or making your user experience better.

In steps “Set Window Title”. It’s a fast, easy to maintain way to give your users some insight into what you’re working on, or how much longer they need to wait. The best part of it all is you don’t need a “Refresh Window” step to update it. The window title gets updated and is not context dependent. Just set it and forget it.

Set Window Title doesn't need a window refresh...

 
Published in FileMaker, Tips and tricks and Uncategorized by Chad Sager. Tags: Tags: , .

Separation Model Smackdown Video Recording

Published on January 31, 2011. 5 Comments

Here’s the complete video feed of last Tuesday’s meeting. Thanks to Kevin Ayers for presenting, for the equipment, AND for post-processing of the video! This goes a long way toward what we’d like to shoot for in future recordings.

Give it some time to load, it’s over an hour in length.

All in all, a lively discussion!

February’s meeting ought to be a recap of PauseOnError, since a few of us are heading up there, and ought to have some interesting field reports to share.

 
Published in FileMaker and Meeting Recaps by Colin Keefe. Tags: Tags: , , , , .

Show Your Stuff: Using Conditional Formatting to fit long content into fixed width fields

Published on January 7, 2011. 0 Comments

A common problem I run into is not being able to see all the information I need to in list view.  Consider the list view shown below, taking note of the Full Name field:

ListView1

As you can see, longer content – such as very long names – don’t fit within the allotted space.  Ordinarily you could just set anchors to have the field grow to the right, but in this particular use case, we already have one anchored field – Notes – set to grow rightward.

In this type of situation, I can call on Conditional Formatting to save the day.  I actually got the inspiration for this one by using the calculator on my iPod Touch.  Type a number and it appears in the calculator, pretty large.  If you keep typing digits, then number gets smaller to fit in the area of the display.   Brilliant! Continue reading ‘Show Your Stuff: Using Conditional Formatting to fit long content into fixed width fields’

 
Published in FileMaker and Tips and tricks by Jerry Salem. Tags: Tags: .

Please Join Us January 25: Separation Model Smackdown!

Published on January 5, 2011. 2 Comments
Greetings FileMaker Enthusiasts,
Our next Philadelphia FileMaker Developer Group meeting has been scheduled for Tuesday evening, January 25th 2011 at 6:00 PM. The meeting will be held at the IT Solutions Fort Washington Office.
414 Commerce Dr., Suite 150, Fort Washington, PA 19034
Google Map
Please RSVP here if you are planning to attend this meeting.

SEPARATION MODEL SMACKDOWN!

With Kevin Ayers and Jason Mundok
versus
Presented in a loose debate format, Kevin and Jason will argue the respective merits of the Separation Model versus the Unified Model.  Kevin is a strong proponent of the benefits of Separation architecture, and Jason…well, let’s just say he’s skeptical.  Don’t get him started.
Well, okay, get him started. Continue reading ‘Please Join Us January 25: Separation Model Smackdown!’
 
Published in FileMaker and Meeting Announcements by Colin Keefe. Tags: Tags: , , , , , .

Year End Meeting Recap

Published on December 10, 2010. 0 Comments

I’m going to let a first time attendee, Patricia Kirby Gibler (of enable businesses), give her thoughts on last Tuesday’s meeting – which she’s kindly letting me reprint from an email she sent us the day after the meeting.  They’re not just kind words – they’re an eloquent description of the power of FileMaker to empower users.  “Turning data into relationships” indeed.

It also reinforces my belief in the power of face-to-face interaction.  User groups have been around for decades upon decades now, and they might feel a little old-school to some  (maybe a little rebranding is in order: PhillyFilemakerMeetup?), but IMO there’s still no substitute for people talking together in the same room.

Italics below are mine. Continue reading ‘Year End Meeting Recap’

 
Published in FileMaker and Meeting Recaps by Colin Keefe. Tags: Tags: , , .