Customer Reviews

Advanced FileMaker Pro 5.5 Techniques for Developers (With CD-ROM)

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Don't expect Moyer and Bowers to coddle you -- instead you will be presented with some challenging advanced material that will stretch your FileMaker chops.

Especially noteworthy is the excellent and in-depth chapter on Secure Login Systems (and sample files). This "how-to" will really help developers understand the benefits, as well as some of the potential pitfalls, of using a global log-in scheme, and there was a real need in the FMP community for professional-quality, advanced information on the topic (as well as for info on other topics that are covered).

I have used Filemaker for a long time for a number of tasks, but this book allowed me to understand the real range of FileMaker Pro. This is a true development tool. The examples are complex and detailed but still understandable. This is a great book, I really recommend it for advanced FileMaker users (this is not a beginner's book).

If you are a developer or just a keen user who is looking at enhancing what they can do with FileMaker this is the book for you. There aren't many books of this type for FileMaker but luckily this is a really good one. A little short (at 350 pages) the first 120 pages are on relational basics and design that are applicable to any database. Some may skip these chapters but they contain a wealth of information that helps you understand the fundamental structure of your database and how to improve it.

Following chapters go over audit trail, creating a secure login system, advanced use of portals (e.g., using a portal as a selection list and "type-ahead" finds) and rollbacks.The chapter on enhancing your reports with "bucket reports", i.e., subsummary reports that run horizontally across the page instead of down, was particularly useful. Other chapters cover recursive data structures and complex calculations.

If you are not fairly literate with FileMaker you may struggle with some of the concepts as the book assumes you already have reasonable knowledge and pretty much jumps straight in. However, even if you have problems following the text the CD that comes with the book includes the databases so you can pull these apart to see how they work.

While FileMaker is easy to use for most things, there are some higher level functions that developer need that aren't necessarily straight forward to implement - even if you only get a couple of tips from this book it is worth the purchase as many of the examples covered here simply aren't easily available elsewhere

If you are using FileMaker 7, you will probably regret buying this book. If you are not planning on moving to FM7 any time soon, it's a good investment.

This book deserved 4 (or maybe 5) stars before FileMaker 7 was released. But so much of the material here is how to do advanced things that FileMaker 6 and earlier versions made fairly difficult, and that FileMaker 7 makes much easier, and sometimes trivial. That makes this book hard to recommend today.

There's still good material, including possibly the best description of the "relational" part of relational databases available in the FileMaker canon. FileMaker 7 is more complete in the relational area, making understanding of this topic more important than ever.

I *do* very much hope that the authors will release a 2nd edition covering FileMaker 7, and will definitely buy it!

My only complaint about this book would be that I wished it would have been about 10 times as long. The material covered was priceless. I've been developing in FileMaker for several years now and reading this book is like spending an afternoon learning the secrets of someone who's been developing for 10 years...maybe more. These are sound, well thought out concepts that deal with real-world needs. I only hope this is a volume II or III or IV, etc.

This book is a must for the FileMaker developer, and a great study for the beginner.
It covers many developer questions and shows new angles to get more specific in designing, scripting and creating applications.
-Use it as your reference guide, technical dictionary and inspiration book.

I bought this book at the tail end of my first development project. I didn't know anything about relational databases before and wanted to know how to program recursive structures in FileMaker. This book is amazing! I really appreciate how the authors take time to explain good design and development techniques that apply equally to any database system.

Advanced FileMaker Pro 5.5 Techniques for Developers may be a bit simple for advanced developers in some respects, but if you're a database newbie like me, this book hits the target audience perfectly! A+

I've been a Filemaker Developer for over 7 years. My bookshelves are lined with a variety of FM titles. That said, I purchased this book solely on the authors experience (they frequently contribute to FM Advisor Magazine). The techniques shown here are pretty much available within the documentation and tutorials included within Filemaker when you do a standard install.

The examples and layouts are bland- functional but bland. I suggest spending 1/3 less $ and finding the John Mark Osbourne-Matt Petrowsky CD sets. They pack their CDs with great layouts and designs as well as very advanced scripting and calculation information. I still rely on those CD's frequently.

These gents do know Filemaker, and the text and CD do a fine job of explaining very basic database terms, expressions, and design theory. If you are brand new to databases and Filemaker specifically- this would do an adequate job.

If you have a multi-page Acrobat Form and want to automatically fill the form with Filemaker data, optionally emailing/faxing/encrypting it, PF-Merge will do that job for you, without programming. It also merges images! Setup time is under 3 minutes.

Thought I share the above freely downloadable treasure with my fellow Cyberfriends. PF-Merge supports over 20 database platforms and its utilities do not time-out.

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