The Support Group Blog

There are different factors that contribute to a successful custom application. Of course, function is important, but even if the app does exactly what users need it to do, users may not necessarily like it if it's difficult to use due to poor legibility, navigability, responsiveness, etc.

FileMaker, the Workplace Innovation Platform, helps to speed up custom app development, right down to the smallest detail, including design styles. The user interface has a huge impact on user experience. A well-designed interface generally equates to a positive experience. Developers must ensure that they use appropriate and consistent fonts, sizes, colors, images, layouts, and so forth within their applications. They can simply accomplish this by creating custom styles for the apps they design.

The West Side Montessori School (WSMS) has been offering a Montessori program for early learners since 1963. The school has grown from fifteen students to over one hundred and they also offer a teacher education program (WSMS-TEP) for adult learners training to become Montessori teachers. Based on the Upper West Side of New York City, they also have locations in New Jersey and Beijing China. In 2015, they renovated part of the children’s gymnasium into an adult learning space for their WSMS-TEP students. Needless to say, growth and development are important to the founders, faculty and students, both young and young at heart. And so we knew a Workplace Innovation Platform, like FileMaker, would facilitate that growth.

We develop custom business software solutions. Our job is to turn a customer’s business needs into functional, organized and attractive software solutions that improve their business operations. At the end of the day, our job is to make our clients look good inside their organizations.

At the heart of every software product is change. Once projects start to take form, our clients begin to see different possibilities and their minds fill with creative enhancements that will make their software even more valuable. We like when clients get excited about new possibilities, but it can also be difficult in terms of managing expectations.

It occurred to me that the process developers go through when faced with very difficult development challenges is much like the well-known stages of grief that psychologists describe. So here we go on the mental journey of almost every technical person faced with almost insurmountable client challenges.

One of the reasons FileMaker is a superior Workplace Innovation Platform is because of its integration capabilities. When our clients/prospective clients ask us if FileMaker can connect with other applications, my immediate answer is yes! But I think the better question to ask is: "how easily can the FileMaker Platform connect with other applications?" FileMaker offers many ways to integrate with other technologies. I myself have found very few limitations in terms of connecting a FileMaker application with other applications. As FileMaker, Inc. (FMI) releases new versions of the product, the integration capabilities expand. We've been able to connect FileMaker applications with other applications via ODBC/JDBC, live external data sources, PHP/XML APIs and flexible import/export options for many years. And now we have other integration functions like Data API (REST), cURL options in Insert from URL, native JSON functions as well as many JSON specific custom functions and a FileMaker and Tableau integration via a Tableau connector.

Since this time of year is associated with giving, we thought that we would share a FileMaker iOS gift. We created a retirement app using the FileMaker SDK. Some of us may find this app useful sooner than others, but we hope you benefit either way.  The free app is available on iPad only on the Apple App Store. 

Fun fact: the term debug was coined by Admiral Grace Hopper while working on the Mark II computer in the 1940's. A moth became stuck inside the computer and Grace commented that they were debugging the computer as they literally worked to remove the bug. The moth was eventually freed and then the term stuck. You can now find that moth at the Smithsonian Museum. 

Back when I was introduced to JavaScript, I used alert dialogs to debug my javascript code. If you're chuckling reading this then you're probably a pro! If not, you should watch my demo where I show you a few different ways to invoke a JavaScript debugger to help you find a bug or resolve a semantic issue in your code.

Let’s Play Cards!

The Card Window was introduced in FileMaker 16. We learned some pretty cool development techniques and use cases for Card Windows during a FileMaker Developer Conference 2018 session.

TRANSACTIONS

Card Windows can be a great tool for transactional programming. You can easily arrange for transactional events to either pass or fail, meaning all edits/adds/deletes that happen during the transaction are either committed or not. Cards can be leveraged to guide the user through a process, storing the data via global fields, variables or JSON arrays along the way. Ultimately, the data will only be committed if the user completes all of the steps. Incidentally, you can also use slide panels to create this user experience. 

We can’t give you “flowers in spring or robins that sing”, but we can give you some great advice!

There are at least 12 signs  you need a custom business application.  Most of our clients contact us because they have a problem:

• Inefficient workflows hindering employees
• Difficulties connecting their website to their database
• Manual data entry wasting precious time and money

We've created a cheat sheet to help you directly access the files in FileMaker Cloud. There are a few tutorials on the web, but none of them quite work anymore so we thought it would be useful for us to share one that does.

There are times when you may need to get to something in your FileMaker Cloud instance’s folder structure. Perhaps you need to access an old log file or even a file within the Documents folder - whatever the reason, you’ll know it when you need it. Please be aware that it's not a good idea to mess around with any of the files in the instance unless you have a backup and know what you’re doing. Having said that, here are three things you'll need to get started.  

If you've ever planned an event, you can appreciate the immense amount of organization, coordination and communication required to effectively manage all aspects of the logistics. Technology, when leveraged effectively, can be extremely helpful in the process. Oftentimes event planners don't understand when and/or how to implement technology to streamline and automate tasks and information.

The prestigious University of California at Berkeley (UCB) came to us to help them streamline their event planning and management systems. The University Development and Alumni Relations department is responsible for generating and maintaining support for the university through various outreach initiatives including events for the Chancellor and fundraisers. The benefits of these programs circulate back to resources for the students and help the university to maintain its position as a world-famous institution.