Proceed with caution since there might some hidden ‘gotchas’ that haven’t come to light yet. But if you don’t use Web publishing, older excel exports (Pre-Excel 2007), Asian characters and 0 and negative decimal place, you might dip your toe in the water.

OS upgrades are serious business, especially with production systems, so we don’t recommend jumping in cold. Test on a development server and non-production clients first, and be sure and have a full backup of both your computer and custom FileMaker solution.

 

Our next Philadelphia FileMaker Developer Group meeting has been scheduled for Tuesday evening, April 26th 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: http://tinyurl.com/37mhhh

Please RSVP here if you are planning to attend this meeting:
http://www.fmpug.com/rsvp.php?eventID=1176

Zulu and DocuBin Overview

We’re tremendously excited to report that John Sindelar of SeedCode and Jesse Barnum of 360Works will join us to talk about two products, Zulu and DocuBin.

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

About the Speakers

John Sindelar has worked in FileMaker for over 15 years and is the developer behind SeedCode, authors and publishers of elegant FileMaker Pro templates, including SeedCode Calendar. John is a featured DevCon speaker, runs the Seattle FMPug user group, and is one of the organizers of Pause on Error. John received the 2004 FileMaker Excellence Award for ‘Developing Outstanding Technical Resources for the FileMaker Pro Community.’ SeedCode’s calendar won the 2010 FileMaker Excellence Award for “Solution of the Year”.

http://www.seedcode.com/

Jesse Barnum founded 360Works in 1996 to do custom FileMaker consulting and development, as well as extensions and developer tools for FileMaker. Jesse and his team have created numerous FileMaker extensions including SuperContainer, ScriptMaster, and Scribe. Jesse has been invited to be a speaker at the 2008 and 2009 FileMaker Developer Conference, and was the 2009 winner of the Outstanding Contribution to the FileMaker Community award. He is certified in FileMaker 7 through 11, and is a platinum member of the FileMaker Business Alliance.

http://www.360works.com/

About the Philadelphia FileMaker User Group

The Philadelphia FileMaker User Group was founded in 2004 as an initiative by FileMaker Business Alliance Platinum member IT Solutions Consulting.  The group’s goal is to provide an open forum for FileMaker developers and those interested in FileMaker to meet, brainstorm and network.

We hold meetings the 4th Tuesday of every month at 6PM, in the office of IT Solutions Consulting, Inc., at 414 Commerce Drive, Suite 150, Fort Washington PA.

Meetings are open to all, regardless of background and there’s no charge to attend.

Please subscribe to our Mailing List to get announcements on upcoming meetings. The list is set to Announce only, so the volume is typically between one and 2 emails a month.

http://fmpug.com/mailman/listinfo/philly_fmpug.com/

You can read our blog to get updates and meeting recaps:

http://www.phillyfilemaker.org/

Twitter here:

http://twitter.com/phillyfilemaker

We’re also an FMPug Chapter:  http://www.fmpug.com/ Consider membership today, especially if you purchase training, plugins, 3rd party products, or web/filemaker hosting – FMPug membership affords considerable discounts across a range of offerings.

Finally, The Philadelphia FileMaker User Group is hosted by:

IT Solutions Consulting, Inc.

Employee ownership – fueling our innovation, strengthening your business.
http://www.itsolutions-inc.com/
Learn more about us on our new Videos/Blog Page!
http://www.itsolutions-inc.com/videos_blog/index.html

 

Shout out again to Kevin Ayers for handling all things video, so we can share this with the group and the interwebs.

As usual give it some time to load, it’s over an hour in length.

If you can’t see the embedded video, try downloading here.

 

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...

 

I realize that many of you are in regions that, on initial consideration, might not seem fertile ground for a user group.  You may feel that being located in a smaller metropolitan area or rural region is an insurmountable roadblock to getting a group started.  What’s the point of holding a first meeting if there’s no one else around?

Your first step is finding the 2 or 3 or 10 people you can connect with and agree to meet in person. We’ll get into the meat and potatoes of managing the group later; there’s no point talking about it until you’ve got enough interest to fill at least the seats around a kitchen table or bar booth. Finding people is, admittedly, hard.  Luckily, there are plenty of online resources to datamine for prospects.

I ask for forbearance from those of you for whom all of this is painfully obvious.  It’s not obvious to everybody, and this suite of blog posts is oriented to those at the beginner/intermediate stage of social networking (remember: user groups were perfecting social networking when Twitter’s founder was still in diapers).

FileMaker(!)

It would make sense to start here, wouldn’t it?  I would humbly suggest that if you’re serious about starting a user group, it would behoove you to contact your regional BAM (Business Account Manager).  BAMs are chiefly concerned with getting FileMaker into medium to large sized corporations – that’s their job – but they have a vested interest in seeding fertile ground with the FileMaker brand.  If you don’t know who your BAM is, find out.  Call FileMaker.

FMPug

fmpug.com is the defacto clearinghouse for most FileMaker User Groups around the world.  It’s really in your best interest to contact Andy or Heather at FMPug and ask them if they know of anybody in your region who’s approached them in the past about starting a group.  There may have been earlier attempts – and the initiators of those attempts should be your first prospects.

FileMaker specific prospect resources

Next let’s talk about the large, FileMaker oriented searchable directories and forums.  You’re going to want to search for folks in your city/county, neighboring areas, and so on.

The FileMaker Consultant Search Page – These are generally people who are fulltime FileMaker developers in one sense or another – either large businesses or sole proprietors.  If anybody’s going to be interested in FileMaker, these folks are it.

FMPug Business Directory – FMPug.com has its own member directory which is worth searching.  While most members belong to local chapters, there are also “Virtual Chapter” members – people in the FMPug community who, like you, are too far from a physical group.  Check to see if there are others in your area and start networking.

FindFileMakerDevelopers.com – Like the FileMaker Consultant Search page, but with a different set of search tools and more comprehensive profile information in the listing results.  The two sites don’t overlap 100%, so don’t forget to search both.

fmforums.com – If you haven’t joined this site, you should –  even if you aren’t trying to set up a group.  This is the oldest and largest online forum dedicated to FileMaker around, and is extremely active.  Post a solicitation to the Chit Chat forum thread.

filemakertoday.com – Ditto with FileMaker today – joining both forums has immeasurable value to you as developer irrespective of whether you get this user group thing off the ground.  Same deal: post your intentions, and solicit feedback.

Other online Directories

Okay, let’s say for the sake of argument that you’ve exhausted all of the above resources.  What next?

Google, LinkedIn, Twitter and FaceBook.

Google

Hm.  Can we just assume you know how to use this?  Please?  No?  Then try Google with training wheels.

LinkedIn

If you don’t yet have a profile on LinkedIn, set one up now (mine’s here).  It’s indispensable, and an excellent calling card to boot, if you’re looking for work.  For networking /research purposes, it’s a great tool.  There are quite a few uses you can make of it to search for user group prospects:

• Keyword searches
• People searches
• Question/Answer searches
• Group affiliations (and networking through them)

I’m not going to get into all of them, but will just throw up keyword searching as an example.  Let’s say, for the sake of argument, that I’m trying to set up a group in Nebraska.

A simple keyword search for FileMaker

Searching for FileMaker…of course

yields 18000 results:

Not too shabby!

I can then filter by location – I see 1084 listings in Boston.  Well, that’s nice, but I’m all the way over here in NE. I can manually key in a search for Nebraska, and I now see:

10 is better than nothing

Lincoln, Nebraska: 10.  One of the core concepts of LinkedIn, by the way, is that you can only see the full profiles of those who are in your network (by being connected to someone who is somehow connected to you).  For me, only one of the contacts in Lincoln is connected to me.  He’s connected to me through 3 current FileMaker employees, though, so definitely someone I would want to consider contacting if I were starting a group in Nebraska.  If I were I an actual NE resident, I’d likely be connected to more than 1 of those 10.

This is where it starts to get to be about networking.  Let’s say I contact this guy, tell him of my plans, and ask for referrals to other people who might be interested.  He is much more likely than I am to know people who may be interested in what I have planned.

The interesting thing about this – and where LinkedIn really expands on the pool of prospects – is that it’s keyword searching on profiles that have FileMaker listed anywhere – it’s not just the bigwig consultants, it’s power users, business owners, IT people, data entry folks…everybody who has had a stake in FileMaker somewhere in their careers.

Next up:

Twitter

I have to admit I’m a reluctant Twitterer.  It’s not because I don’t like the medium per se – it’s more that opening TweetDeck, for someone who can’t wash dishes and hold a conversation at the same time, is a rabbit hole of “multitasking” distractions that leave a gaping half hour blank void in my workday.  I launch, do my minimum bit, and exit as gracefully as I can, before any of the glittering feeds tempt me.

That said, I highly recommend exploring Twitter simply because it’s one of those rare places where you can toss a random 140 character question like: “I’m in Bangor ME, want to start a #FileMaker user group.  Interested?”  and get answers (and a half dozen spam follow requests) in five minutes.

Do it, even if you hate it.  Just remember you can always pack Twitter away, a rarely used tool.

And, of course, if you find you don’t hate it, you may discover that there is a thriving FileMaker community on Twitter. It’s real, and it’s worth exploring in itself.

Facebook

I’m one of those who keeps my life fairly compartmentalized.  My FileMaker life lives here on phillyfilemaker, and on LinkedIn, and FaceBook is where my personal and art life is more comprehensively represented.  I’ve found that it’s really different for everyone; it may be that FaceBook is the ideal platform for you for what we’re trying to do here.  It comes down to personality type and comfort levels. Anyway, where FaceBook shines – and why it may make sense for you to exploit it for this purpose – is that it’s the epitome of social networking.  You could set up a FaceBook page for “The Bloomington/Normal FileMaker User Group”; you could join FileMaker specific groups and post questions to their walls…there are myriad possibilities here.

Okay, time for a search / social networking break.

At this point I’ll make couple of random observations:

• Continually expanding your search should be your MO; be promiscuous in your efforts.
• Look for local community gate-keepers: you want that person who can act as the hub who will lead you to other prospects.
• This whole User Group search sounds a lot like job hunting, doesn’t it?  And it smells like sales and marketing too.  That’s not a mistake.  You’re selling your idea and trying to obtain buy-in.  The only real difference here is that your currency is mindshare rather than cash.
• The corollary to the previous bullet point is that you need to learn sales skills.  Don’t worry, it won’t hurt a bit.  And picking up the confidence to build a User Group has dividends in other areas of your professional life.

That’s it for now.  I know, all you Social Networking wonks are yawning by now anyway.  This blog post was not for you

In the next installment I’ll do my best to cover the tools and services you should try to add to your toolkit to start and manage your group.  I’ll cover:

• FMPug affiliation
• Mailing List management (Mailman (FMPug uses this), FileMaker, FMSpark, MailChimp, etc)
• Event listing services
• Blogs and websites

Some of this will be my version of “best practices”, some will simply be observations about what completely failed for us

I’ll open the floor here: anyone have any other ideas they’d like to add or comment on the topic of finding group members?  Or any other thoughts?

Group Coordinators: What did you do when you started your group?  What were your learning experiences?

- Colin

 

Andy Gaunt at FMPug has generously offered to set up a second listserv for us, for group members to engage in discussion. It’s called PhillyFMTalk.

It’s opt-in; you won’t get on the list unless you explicitly send a subscribe email. Use it to talk about FileMaker, network, suggest meeting topics/agenda, post availability for work, or…whatever you like, really. The point is to get you all engaged with each other outside of the monthly meetings. It’s not meant to replace the FMPugTalk mailing list or Technet – this is meant as a purely local, group oriented resource.

The existing listserv will remain announce-only, so if that’s all you’re interested in, you don’t need to do a thing.

To subscribe to the new list, look for the subscribe links in the sidebar to the right.

On another note: I’ve set up a tab on the blog for Members (right overhead, yep, right…there!) and am mulling over what to do with it. So a good first topic for the PhillyFMTalk list might be what I should be doing with this space.

 

Recap!

Two dozen FileMaker enthusiasts converged on the the IT Solutions office for the 5th Annual PFUG Year End Bonanza on December 15th.

We continued our annual tradition of vendor discussions and giveaways, of course – congratulations to Dan Stein, Todd Chronister, Walter Burns, Preston Cabe, Tim Lynott, Mike Ahern, Bryant Minard, Gale Raspen and Michael Reddy for winning bonanza prizes from our generous sponsors! And a big thanks to SolutionMakers, Ben Waldie, ProofGroup and Seed Code, Thorsen Consulting, 360Works and Real EVO for participating and contributing to our event.

Our 2008 predictions for 2009 were, as usual, mostly wrong, but I don’t think anyone can be faulted for not guessing all the twists and turns 2009 held in store for us.  We’ll have to wait until December 2010 before we can weigh in on the latest batch – though I somehow doubt “BJ and the Bear” will make it to the big screen this year (sorry, Jason).

We spent a good portion of the meeting discussing the long range focus and goals of the user group, a free-ranging roundtable conversation that included:

• How to increase monthly attendance
• How to tailor the meeting structure for better participation, away from the active presenter/passive audience model
• Better networking and support methods between members
• In general, how to make the group more useful for the members

All in all a great way to end the year – and a big thanks to Jason Fiske of FMI for providing the excellent buffet!

Goals!

Some of the takeaways that we’ll be acting on…

Meeting Structure

We’re going to move the “Stump the Chump” session from its current slot at the end of the presentation to the opening slot; e.g. after opening remarks we’ll jump right into it. Also…we are ALL Chumps.  Previously we picked folks to answer questions from members; now it’ll be a free-for-all (which it always devolved to anyway!).

Presenters will be asked to tailor their presentations for more interactivity, where possible: in other words, where it makes sense to “workshop” a topic, let’s encourage that.

2009 was heavy on “big names”: most of our presenters had a history of speaking at DevCons and other venues, had high level topics that may have had the “just getting started” developer feeling a little left in the dark.  In 2010 we’ll be mixing things up a bit – more roundtable discussions, more group critiques of member work, more member presentations.  We’re going to keep getting whatever superstars we can, but hopefully the mix will be more healthy.

Audience Building

Up until now, who shows up at meetings has been pretty much dependent on the size and quality of our mailing list, and exposure we get through various passive advertising venues – the FMPug site, syndication of this blog, and so on.  That’s all well and good, but in my opinion our reach is limited.  This is promotion, not networking.

Since it’s in the best interest of the members to have sizable attendance, fresh faces and all that comes from a growing audience – because of the networking opportunities, job prospects, and information sharing – we’re charging you, the members, with the responsibility of spreading the word about the group.  Tell your co-workers, your clients, your consultants, and your friends.

Bring someone who has never used FileMaker before.

Bring that IT guy across the room who hates FileMaker, so he can see what it’s all about.

In short, evangelize.

We’re averaging 18 people a meeting; it would be very nice to reach 25 this year.  And it can only benefit you to reach that number.

Networking

You may recall we discussed how to encourage member communication between the monthly meetings.  At the moment we have a single mailing list, announcement only, and some of you belong to the FMPUGTalk list, which encompasses all user groups.

We’re going to look into setting up a mailing list for members to provide a localized communication resource – you’ll be able to post questions, jobs, chat or whatever you like.  That’ll be forthcoming and I should have some news on it at the next meeting at month’s end.

We also discussed the idea of member profiles on the blog or of finding some way to provide a public face for the members – for each other and to raise the profile of the group by giving it a personalized identity.

We’re going to look into this as well, though I don’t expect any movement on it before the January meeting.

That’s it for now.  I’ll be announcing the next meeting (January 26) early next week.

Happy FileMaking!

- Colin

 

October 27th Meeting

- Matt O’Dell of FileMaker, Inc: The Power of Automation – Exploring Script Sequences in FileMaker Server 10
— About the Presenter
- Stump the Chump on holiday!

Other News

- October 29th: FREE FileMaker Seminar from IT Solutions; iPod Shuffle giveaway (details below)
- New Training Classes from IT Solutions
- FMPug News: “The Everything Reference 3″ available to all as a FREE download, free PRINT version with new FMPug Membership
- About the Philadelphia FileMaker User Group

October 27th Meeting

Greetings FileMaker Enthusiasts,

Our next Philadelphia FileMaker User Group meeting has been scheduled for Tuesday evening, October 27th 2009 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: http://tinyurl.com/37mhhh

As always, pizza and soft drinks will be provided.

Please RSVP here if you are planning to attend this meeting:

http://www.fmpug.com/rsvp.php?eventID=945

Matt O’Dell of FileMaker, Inc:

The Power of Automation – Exploring Script Sequences in FileMaker Server 10

Matt will be covering different ways of using the new FileMaker Server 10 feature of Script Sequences. This feature allows developers to schedule command line scripts in tandem with FileMaker scripts. The presentation will includes examples of setting up data files for a server import, managing performance monitoring within FileMaker, swapping a hosted file with a clone file, and more.

About the presenter:

Matt O’Dell is a Systems Engineer with FileMaker in the Northeast. He has 10+ years experience using FileMaker and building web solutions. Along with being a certified FileMaker Developer, he also is an authorized FTS trainer and a certified MySQL 5.0 developer. Prior to working for FileMaker, Matt was an application developer, trainer, tech support with Soliant Consulting in Chicago.

Stump the Chump – Sit down with an expert for advice/troubleshooting

The Stump the Chump session is on holiday this month.  If you’d like to be a Chump, please get in touch and I’ll slot you in; in the meantime if anyone has questions or challenges to present we’ll tackle them in roundtable fashion!

Other News

October 29th: FREE FileMaker Seminar hosted by IT Solutions:

“Streamline Work Flow & Increase Productivity with FileMaker”

FREE iPod shuffle; eligibility details below

Integrating fragmented data systems in an organization is one of the first steps in streamlining work flow for any organization. When the same data are entered in multiple systems, errors are inevitable. On the other hand, if all of your data reside in a single system ,but users don’t have access to it when they need it, bottlenecks can occur and work flow suffers. At IT Solutions, we’ve been working with our clients for years to increase productivity by removing road blocks in work flow. We have collected a number of different features that we’ve recently implemented in FileMaker systems and would like to share these features with you at an October 29th client seminar.

Streamline Work Flow & Increase Productivity with FileMaker will be an information-packed ½ day seminar at the Hub Cira Centre, conveniently located right next to Philadelphia’s 30th Street Station. The keynote speaker for the October 29th session will be IT Solutions’ Certified FileMaker Developer/Trainer Jason Mundok and topics will include:

System Integration: connecting FileMaker to other applications in your organization

Direct Communication: messaging and alerts from within FileMaker

Indirect Communication: dynamic onscreen alerts for “at-a-glance” status reporting

Transparency: queues and filtered lists for prioritizing next action

Streamline Work Flow & Increase Productivity with FileMaker will be held from 9:30 am to noon, with registration starting at 9:00 am, followed immediately by a Starr Events-catered buffet lunch at the Hub.  IT Solutions staff will be available during lunch to answer additional questions and provide more details on any and all FileMaker topics.

The first 10 people to register themselves and a colleague from another business will get a FREE iPod shuffle. Space for the complimentary seminar is very limited so sign up as soon as possible to reserve your seat. To register quickly and easily online visit: http://www.itsolutions-inc.com/who_we_are/events2.html. For more information contact Andrea Leadbeater at andrea.leadbeater@itsolutions-inc.com or 866.PICK.ITS.

We look forward to seeing you in October!

New FileMaker Training opportunities at IT Solutions Consulting

IT Solutions has announced its fall Training Schedule, available here:

http://www.itsolutions-inc.com/who_we_are/events.html

In addition to our 101 and Intermediate Training offerings, we’ve added new, more focused courses so you can selectively train on particular features or technologies – all of them single day trainings, which makes them much easier to fit into a busy work schedule. If you haven’t given our course listings a look recently, it’s worth a visit.  I’m especially excited about the FileMaker-In-Action Workshop!

11/2/2009 – FileMaker 101 for FileMaker 10

11/3/2009 – 11/4/2009 – FileMaker Intermediate for FileMaker 10

11/10/2009 – FileMaker Focus Series: Data Modeling (FTS curriculum)

11/17/2009 – FileMaker Focus Series: Working with Layouts (FTS curriculum)

11/19/2009 – FTS Extras: Advanced Techniques and ESS (FTS curriculum)

12/8/2009 – FileMaker Focus Series: Calculation Functions (FTS curriculum)

12/15/2009 – FileMaker Focus Series: Scripts (FTS curriculum)

12/17/2009 – FTS Extras: FileMaker Server and Web Publishing (FTS curriculum)

Dates to be announced – FileMaker-In-Action Workshop

FMPUG News: “The Everything Reference 3″ available as a FREE download!

The kind folks at FMPug have made The Everything Reference 3 available for free as a PDF download. The Everything Reference series was created to bring together the most needed reference materials for FileMaker developers into a single easy-to-use source. The Everything Reference 3 is completely compatible with FileMaker 10 and includes such useful tools as a modifier key cheat sheet, Unicode charts, FileMaker error codes, a FileMaker functions quick reference, and much much more. There are even articles from some of the top names in the business, such as John Mark Osborne and Steven Blackwell.

Visit http://ref.fmpug.com/ to download your free copy today!

As a bonus, if you register to become a FMPug member (or are a currently active member) before November, you’ll receive a free PRINT version of The Everything Reference 3!   Visit http://www.fmpug.com/ to become a member.

About the Philadelphia FileMaker User Group

The Philadelphia FileMaker User Group was founded in 2004 as an initiative by FileMaker Business Alliance Platinum member IT Solutions Consulting.  The group’s goal is to provide an open forum for FileMaker developers and those interested in FileMaker to meet, brainstorm and network.

We hold meetings the 4th Tuesday of every month at 6PM, in the office of IT Solutions Consulting, Inc., at 414 Commerce Drive, Suite 150, Fort Washington PA.

Meetings are open to all, regardless of background and there’s no charge to attend.

Please subscribe to our Mailing List to get announcements on upcoming meetings. The list is set to Announce only, so the volume is typically between one and 2 emails a month.

http://fmpug.com/mailman/listinfo/philly_fmpug.com/

You can read our blog to get updates and meeting recaps:

http://www.phillyfilemaker.org/

We’re also an FMPug Chapter:  http://www.fmpug.com/ Consider membership today, especially if you purchase training, plugins, 3rd party products, or web/filemaker hosting – FMPug membership affords considerable discounts across a range of offerings.

Finally, The Philadelphia FileMaker User Group is hosted by:

IT Solutions Consulting, Inc.

Employee ownership – fueling our innovation, strengthening your business.

http://www.itsolutions-inc.com/

- Learn about our new FileMaker support offerings: FMAssist and FMAssure!

- www.itsolutions-inc.com/our_solutions/application_development/fm_assist.html