[Review] Developing for Maximum WAN Performance – Skeleton Key Training

Recently, I participated in a workshop with Mark Richman, Owner of Skeleton Key.  Simply an awesome workshop.  If you develop in FileMaker, this is a good workshop to sign up for.  The most benefit comes to those who develop solutions that will be accessed via a network and ‘remote’ FileMaker client, but some of what you go through may affect how you develop for local, non-hosted solutions also.  Here is a brief snippet of the article featured over on FileMakerToday.com and a link to the full article.

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Over time, there are moments that will drastically redefine how you develop solutions in FileMaker. Moments that take the knowledge you already have, add to it and make you a better developer. On April 26, I had one of those moments.

Read Full Article Here.

Generating Sample Data for Testing

Throughout the process of developing a solution, testing each aspect of your file is vital.  For me, the problem I always used to run into, was generating enough sample data to properly test my scripts, calculations and performance.  Well, that was until I found Fake Name Generator.

What Fake Name Generator Does

Are you a Rockstar or are you a Superhero?

Frequently, on my journey of knowledge, I encounter articles that fascinate me…I came across one when it popped up in Google Reader this morning. It’s trivial, but it hit me as a very important distinction. As a FileMaker developer, are you a Rockstar or are you a Superhero?

Jason Thomas of Skeleton Key brought up this question is his blog. (Read the full article here) Jason points out the reason Skeleton Key hires only Superheros and NO Rockstars. I have to agree with him, Rockstars may have their fans, but it seems always for the wrong reasons. And the arrogance that goes along with many Rockstars, isn’t usually good for business.

Here is Jason’s contrasting comparison of Superheros and Rockstars:

Video Training for FileMaker 11

Lynda.com has always been one of my favorite places to check out software and get some quality online training and tutorials.  They just posted a new video course for FileMaker’s latest release of it’s flagship product FileMaker Pro. Cris Ippolite does a great job explaining the new features of FileMaker 11 and instructing the viewer about how to build

Possible Dangers When Working On a LIVE Database

If you have never been warned about the dangers of working on schema and structure changes on a LIVE FileMaker database…here is a really good example for why you should NOT be doing such craziness. While I considered writing something up, Chad does a great job showing

Getting Global Calculations to Behave

Here is a list of items to keep in mind when using Global Calculations.  It was originally written by Ray Cologon back in 2007/2008 (and reposted around different blogs and the FileMaker Cafe)…but I believe most of it still applies to how it works today in he current versions of FileMaker.  I’ll repost with an update if I find out otherwise.

1. A global calc will update automatically if it references a global field that is located in the same table and that field is edited by

Insert Merge Variables

I came across this post on the FileMaker forum, and thought it was a good idea to share. Simple, effective.

[ Tip ] Insert Merge Variable
03-25-2010 01:06 PM by mr_vodka

Just thought I would share this with others; especially those that have not played with merge variables yet ( dunno if it has been shared on other sites yet ).

With the implementation of layout level variables, they can be used as layout level calculations.

To address the refreshing of the data one could use

FileMaker 11 and ODBC Changes

Here is an article that I thought anyone using ODBC would want to take note of. Take special note of the lack of back-ward/for-ward compatibility between the different driver versions. Also, mind you, I haven’t tested everything in this article. I just wanted to pass the info along.

This is from a blog post over at SkeletonKey.com

Creating a Folder from FileMaker (Windows)

Being that many of the contributors on the forum that I frequent are Mac-centric, I thought I would share a simple way to create folders on a windows machine.  I will give you the code, and then break down what it does, so you can tweak it to fit your needs.