1. Pages:
  3. 1
  4. 2
  5. 3
  6. 4
  7. 5
  8. 6
  9. 7
  10. 8
  11. 9
  12. 10
  13. ...
  14. 25
Beverly Voth, Level: Intermediate, Version: FM 16 or later

Export Field Contents (Update for FM 16)

beverlyvoth

Editor’s note: I am thrilled to feature a guest article by Beverly Voth.

In the article “An In-Depth Look at “Export Field Contents” (here), the study of how FileMaker exports text as single field contents is compared to the standard FileMaker Exports. Some of these present a problem when the field (exported) gets converted to something which a receiving system may reject as invalid. Several methods and alternative “fixes” are presented, including using XML & XSLT.

Update! NEW IN FMP 16 – we have a FIX!

There is a new function in FileMaker Pro (and Advanced) 16 that “fixes” a couple problems with Export Field Contents (namely the encoding and end-of-line). Instead of the Base64 nested function trick use the new Function:

TextEncode( text ; encoding ; lineEndings )

Reference: FM16 Help: TextEncode

Using TextEncode() & Export Field Contents

Set Field [ container ; TextEncode ( text ; encoding ; lineEndings ) ]

Continue reading “Export Field Contents (Update for FM 16)” →

ExecuteSQL, Level: Intermediate, SQL, Version: FM 12 or later

User-Friendly Excel Exports, part 7

Kevin Frank

16 Sep 2017: this file (Excel Exports, v7d) fixes a bug where empty fields would cause values to appear in the wrong columns.

This is a follow up to last week’s part 6, with three refinements.

Continue reading “User-Friendly Excel Exports, part 7” →

Level: Intermediate, Version: FM 12 or later

User-Friendly Excel Exports, part 6

Kevin Frank

16 Sep 2017: this file (Excel Exports, v7d) fixes a bug where empty fields would cause values to appear in the wrong columns.

29 Mar 2017: this file (Excel Exports, v6d) fixes a formatting bug when currency values < 1000 are not preceded by a “$”. Explanation forthcoming in next week’s “part 7” article.

Recently I was asked to implement user-friendly Excel exports on a WAN-based solution, utilizing some of the techniques explored earlier in this series (part 1, part 1.1, part 2, part 3, part 4 and part 5 — all from five years ago). There was just one problem: while performance was great locally, and okay on a LAN, it was decidedly less-than-satisfactory across a WAN.

Well today we’re going to look at three demos showcasing a brilliant, outside-the-box technique I picked up from Beverly Voth, which is not only significantly faster on a WAN (4x or 5x faster), but also remedies some other shortcomings associated with my earlier approaches.

Demo files:

Continue reading “User-Friendly Excel Exports, part 6” →

Level: Intermediate, Version: FM 13 or later

PDF with Embedded Links

Kevin Frank

Author’s note: I’d like to offer a big thank you to Christian Schmitz of Monkeybread Software, not only for creating and continually improving a fantastic plug-in, but also for promptly and patiently answering my many questions.

A few weeks ago we looked at creating a table of contents for a PDF containing nine individual reports. The article ended by asking a somewhat rhetorical question…

Now that we have a table of contents for our master report, wouldn’t it be nice if we could hyperlink each TOC entry to its corresponding report within the PDF?

2017-02-10_180551

FileMaker doesn’t provide a built-in way to accomplish this, but it can be done using a combination of the MonkeyBread plug-in + DynaPDF Lite, and this will be explored in my next article.

…and today we’re going to dig into the nuts and bolts of what it takes to make this happen.

As usual, we have a demo file (Embedded PDF Links), but since it will only work for developers having licensed copies of the above-mentioned products, here is a PDF showing the end result: Report with Hyperlinked TOC.pdf

Continue reading “PDF with Embedded Links” →

Level: Advanced, Version: FM 13 or later, Virtual List

Virtual List Table Of Contents

Kevin Frank

A few years back I did an article on producing a PDF catalog + table of contents, with the TOC based on a vendor table and the catalog entries based on a products table. Today we’re going to use a different approach to generate a table of contents, building on techniques explored in last year’s Virtual List Reporting series… specifically we’re going to generate one big PDF combining nine reports, prefaced by a table of contents.

2017-01-30_173715

Demo files: virtual-list-toc-v1.zip and virtual-list-toc-v2.zip

2017-01-30_201617

Continue reading “Virtual List Table Of Contents” →

ExecuteSQL, Level: Intermediate, SQL, Version: FM 12 or later

FM/SQL Portal Filter + Dynamic Sort

Kevin Frank

Editor’s note: Today I’m pleased to present a guest article and accompanying demo file written by Joel Englander on using ExecuteSQL + a global multi-line key as an alternative to FileMaker’s built-in portal filtering mechanism, with dynamic portal sorting included as an added bonus.

Demo file: fm-sqlportal-filter-and-dynsort.zip (75 Mb compressed, 230 Mb uncompressed)

browseaksortcitycomp Continue reading “FM/SQL Portal Filter + Dynamic Sort” →

Level: Intermediate

Exploring Problem Spaces

Kevin Frank

Given its primary role as a database product, it’s easy sometimes to forget what a great teaching tool FileMaker Pro can be. One of my favorite educational uses for it is building models to explore problem spaces, for example…

  • viewing all possible outcomes for a problem with boundary conditions
  • conducting trials to confirm the likelihood of a predicted outcome
  • using “brute force” to find the solution to a complex problem

..and today we’re going to look at an example of each of these.

Dice Roll

2016-11-29_021650

Demo Files: Dice Roll, v1 and Dice Roll, v2

Continue reading “Exploring Problem Spaces” →

Level: Intermediate, Version: FM 13 or later, Virtual List

Modal Popovers + Magic Date Value Lists

Kevin Frank

Today we’re going to explore a couple ideas that were glossed over in last month’s article on the CustomList custom function…

  • implementing a “modal” popover
  • using a “magic” value list to display a properly sorted list of dates

…and you can download a copy of today’s demo file, Date Filtration, if you are so inclined.

Modal Popover

One of the most useful FileMaker features introduced in the last few years is the popover (if you aren’t familiar with them, Howard Schlossberg’s presentation provides an excellent introduction). In the standard implementation, you click once to display the popover, and then click anywhere outside the popover to dismiss it.

2016-10-23_112805

Continue reading “Modal Popovers + Magic Date Value Lists” →

Level: Advanced, Version: FM 13 or later

CustomList

Kevin Frank

Earlier this year, in Virtual List Reporting, I used a custom function written by Agnès Barouh called CustomList to generate a couple basic lists, and then remarked…

2016-09-19_000003

Well today I’m going to attempt to make good on that assertion. In case you aren’t already familiar with CustomList, it allows you to iteratively generate and/or parse lists using the full power of the FileMaker calculation engine. CustomList can process up to 500,000 rows — it is non-recursive and very fast — and today we’re going to use it to solve a variety of problems, both real world and theoretical. [Actually, the row limit can be adjusted, and it varies by platform — for full details see the CF definition.]

Today’s article features four demos…

…as well as a number of examples that don’t require a demo to illustrate their point. Continue reading “CustomList” →

Level: Intermediate

Transfer a Found Set to a UI File

Kevin Frank

If you work with the separation model, or any other multi-file configuration where a layout in file A is based on a table in file B, you may have encountered the following situation: while FileMaker makes it easy to transfer a found set from file A to file B…

2016-08-31_195116

…there is no obvious mechanism to go the other direction. Stated in other words, you can easily transfer a found set from an interface (a.k.a. UI) file to a data file, but not vice-versa. Nor for that matter, is there an obvious way to transfer a found set from one UI file to another UI file. Continue reading “Transfer a Found Set to a UI File” →