Customer Reviews

FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced Upgrade

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

 

 

Having just upgraded to Filemaker 9 in November, I was caught by surprise with the upgrade to 10. And of course Filemaker does not provide discounted upgrades unless bought within the last 3 weeks. I had even asked the sales rep before upgrading if anything was in the pipeline and told there was nothing imminent. Version 9 didn't add anything to version 8.5, which only added compatibility with Leopard and a few features over 8. Granted version 10 adds scripting, but I'm getting tired of plunking down money for what should have been minor upgrades in the previous versions. Unless you are wealthy or part of a corporation buying the upgrade, the constant fees to upgrade charged by Filemaker have now become excessive.

Having created a Database Soluiton in 9.0 I was wary of the latest version and not too happy that an upgrade came out so soon after the 9.0 version.

None-the-less, after using File Maker Pro Advanced 10.0 I was very pleased and willing (though still not happy) to spend the money for the upgrade. My solution transferred seamlessly.

The biggest improvement is the interface. The "Preview, Find, Browse, Edit" buttons can now be easily identified by non-users. In 9.0 they were four very small buttons with no obvious purpose. This has eliminated many of the questions I used to receive. The menu being on the top bar (instead of the side bar) was also a big improvement in that users are more familiar with looking for commands along the top.

The built-in "trigger" feature is a great addition also. I was using a third party add-in to warn people they were about to make a permanent change. The trigger feature makes it so much simpler that I've added several other "trigger" messages throughout.

File Maker 10.0 Advanced has been a great improvement for my Database solution. I just hope I pay it off before 11.0 comes out.

Filemaker without a doubt has the best combination of powerful capabilities and ease of use. The latest version uses a little different interface which may take a litte time to get used to if you were using an older version. But the new features are absolutely well worth it! This is definitely the most powerful version of FileMaker yet.

Using FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced (FMP10ADV) for a short time with its new design. Gives me more tools to design, edit, and finalize the way I want my database to operate.

When you need a program to make searching, modifying and able to make reports you need instantly. FMP10ADV does the job with no questions asked.

Upgrade was the smartest thing I ever did. With all the new features added to FMP10ADV I do not know of any database program that can compete with it. I urge any user of FileMaker Pro to upgrade to FMP10ADV today.

Wow! A Cool new interface for the same old stuff!

For the developers who got pissed about this negative review, this is not a developer review. Its just a sliver of my experience so the same does not happen to some one who could fall into the same trap. This review should be properly named as "Go from ROBUST to GOBUST"

2 years ago I hired a developer to make a filemaker database for my research. Brought a copy of Filemaker... what a waste. A time when all the Macworld and even the PCworlds were looking at Macintoshes like they were the Rolls Royce of the ComputerWorld. He did a fine job creating a database for me. But later when I wanted to add a feature that would allow me to import records to excel to analyze them, and to export them for a presentation, I had to do it manually.

Believe me, It was a lot of fun, to do drag and drop in an aqua interface, so my spreadsheet would update as soon as my colleague sent me the updated dataset via apple Mail. The solution felt HOT like the intel-ligent processor core and COOL like the aqua interface!

A solution that would allow a computer user like me to automate or customize the my entire office work was just not yet available on the Mac. Applescript was cute and fun just like my Mac Mini but when it came to do some heavy lifting, there is no easy solution on a mac that would allow you the end user to make customizations of a workflow using a language like VBA or VB.NET. You can learn PHP, Applescript, UNIX and Python or even perl to make data flow from filemaker to excel. You can invent more contorted solutions using Automator and such to make the same data appear in your keynote presentations. If you think that's your destiny, good luck to you and Apple for your "Ad-ventures".

Anyway, I got a friendly college graduate to do the same database solution in MS Office (Access) this time. With her help now I can easily import my database records to Excel from Access in record time, My spreadsheet updates as soon as my colleage saves his excel spreadsheet at his office, My own custom scripts in VBA would allow me to easily create presentations or documents from the data that I looked at, The same kind of stuff I used to do in Python - "Text munging" could be visually done in excel, The processed data could be sent back to Access for storage or exported to any other office application.

With the money that I saved after buying my next-Gen PC for my next Gen Mac, now I can easily hire another "developer" to get my data online.

I gave a star for FMP for being cross platform. Another star for having revamped the interface. Would have given another 2 stars if they had an innovative data-collection app running on the iPhone. Like an online form that would collect data using the iPhone and its technologies. Its time for FMP to understand that stars in reviews dont come for its similarities to existing software but for innovative features if it can offer any.

May be its time to revive Filemaker Mobile?

Even with the newer additions, making your FMP database work seamlessly (workflow automation) with your iWork applications might require you to learn programmming languages from Applescript to AWK. Whereas in MS Office, I use a single scripting language to do all the customizations in all the different office apps.

When will a feature like that ever come to a Mac Near you?