FileMaker Devcon 2019

This year Turkey was added to Devcon countries in Europe. The first Devcon will be held on 22-23 June 2019 in Istanbul.

For more information about FileMaker Devcon visit the official site: www.filemakerdevcon.ist

FileMaker Training Series 15, now Free!

FileMaker discontinued FileMaker Training Series with the release of version 16. FileMaker web site "learning" title is offered now for training materials such as videos, webinars, articles.

But FileMaker training series 15 is available for download, and it is free now.




You can visit link below to download FileMaker Training Series 15 Basic and FileMaker Training Series 15 Advanced

Download FileMaker Traning Series

FileMaker Developer Contest - "Go Farther"

WinSoft International (FileMaker Distributor for Central and East European, Middle Eastern, North African and Indian markets), organizing a FileMaker Developer Contest.

The contest contain two categories; for current FileMaker solutions, or newly developped FileMaker solutions.

For more information click link below for WinSoft's official contest page.
http://www.winsoft-international.com/en/company/FileMaker-developer-contest.html

FileMaker File Sharing Troubles

Last days I get phone calls about FileMaker sharing errors from my customers. I dont remember similar error in past. It is very use to share file or open shared file via FileMaker normally. I have solved the problems about sharing after some experiments and internet search. You can find the easiest way to solve sharing problems below :

How to solve FileMaker Sharing Problem: 'Networking Stack could not be Initialized'

Happy sharing :)

Solutions for FileMaker Network Sharing Errors

Last days I get phone calls about FileMaker sharing errors from my customers. I dont remember similar error in past. It is very use to share file or open shared file via FileMaker normally. I have solved the problems about sharing after some experiments and internet search. You can find the easiest way to solve sharing problems in this page.

You will find error messages in multi-lingual, they will be useful if you are using FileMaker in other languages.

Please leave a comment if your problem is not solved. (see bottom of the page)

Happy sharing :)

The Error Messages 

error / hata / erreur / chyba / fout / errore / bd / / error / fel

English
"FileMaker cannot share or be a client of a file because the networking stack could not be initialized."
"FileMaker cannot share files because another user is already sharing files using FileMaker Pro in this computer."

Türkçe (Turkish)
"Baka bir kullanc bu bilgisayarda FileMaker Pro kullaranak zaten dosyalar paylatrdndan FileMaker dosyalar paylatramyor"
"A yn balatlamadndan FileMaker bir dosyay paylaamyor veya o dosyann istemcisi olamyor."

Française (French)
"Filemaker ne peut partager un fichier ni tre le client d'un fichier car la pile de mise en rseau n'a pu tre initialis
"FileMaker ne peut partager les fichiers, car un autre utilisateur les partage dj avec FileMaker Pro sur cet ordinateur."

etina (Czech)
"FileMaker nemohou sdlet soubor. Nebo bt klientem souboru. Sov rozhran, protoe nemohl bt inicializovn."
"FileMaker nem sdlet soubory, protoe jin uivatel ji na tomto potai sdl soubory pomoc FileMakeru Pro"

Nedherlands (Nedherlands)
"FileMaker kan geen bestanden samengebruiken omdat een adere gebruiker op deze computer reeds bestanden deelt met behulp van FileMaker Pro"

Deutsch (Deutsch)
"FileMaker Pro kann Dateien nicht freigeben, da ein anderer Benutzer bereits Dateien mit FileMaker Pro auf diesem Computer freigibt"

Italiano (Italian)
"FileMaker non pu condividere file. Un altro utente sta condividendo file su questo computer utilizzando FileMaker Pro"

Polski (Polish)
"Program FileMaker nie moe undostepni plikw, poniewa inny uytkownik tego programu ju undestpnia pliki na tym komputerze."

Pycc (Russian)
"FileMaker c , FileMaker ."

Espaol (Spanish)
"FileMaker no puede compartir archivos porque otro usuario estcompartiendo archivos con FileMaker Pro en este equipo."

Svanska (Swedish)
"FileMaker kan inte dela filen. Eller en klient i en fil. Fljd av att ntverksstack kunde inte initieras."
"Du kan inte dela FileMaker filer eftersom en annan anvndare redan delar filer med hjlp av FileMaker Pro p den hr datorn."

The Reason 

reason / neden / raison / dvod / reden / ragione / powodu / / razn / anledning

Probabale case of this error is related to file named server.pem. The file is damaged or missing.

Affected Versions 

FileMaker Pro 7
FileMaker Pro 8,
FileMaker Pro 8.5
FileMaker Pro 9
FileMaker Pro 10
FileMaker Pro 11 (and advanced versions).

OS: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7

Solution 

solution / zm / solution / een / oplossing / soluzione / rozwizanie / / solucin / lsning

FileMaker Inc's official Knowledge Base has some solution suggestions. The easiest and tested of it is copying server.pem file from another computer that FileMaker runs and connects to remote file without any problem.

The file is located at : Program Files/FileMaker/FileMaker Pro X/server.pem

If you don't have another computer runs FileMaker you can simply download the working server.pem file from following link:
www.yazalim.com/filemaker-networking-file

Copy the file in the same place (C:/Program Files/FileMaker/FileMaker Pro X/ )

FileMaker 10 Relased

I can not spare the time for my blogs, but the news I have just seen force me to add a new post. Today FileMaker Inc. announced FileMaker 10 with the phrase : Sleek new look. Intuitive new design.

I did not installed yet, but there are some cool new features:

• Triger scriptting (I have wating many years for this)
• Send email via SMTP
• Dynamic reports
• Cool interface

I will post my comments about FMP10 in future.

Pick One Copy of Duplicate Records

Some times we need to delete duplicate records. I used to define script with loop to do this automatically. But now I show a simple way to do this on an example:

We have some set of records shown in the image below. Assume that we want to make a list of box types, so we should delete duplicates in order to get box list.

There are 9 records in the table above, some products are placed in same box. To pick only one copy of each box sort the records by BoxNo field.

The second step is exporting records. The key point here is grouping, check BoxNo in Group By part of the dialog box.

Click export button. It is ok! Only one copy for each box type is exported. 

Click here to download example file (.fp7)

Save as PDF From FileMaker Runtime File

One of the coolest feature comes with FileMaker Pro 8 is "Save As PDF" option. You can save your report as PDF by selecting Save/Send Records As>PDF from file menu directly from FileMaker.

But if you are planning to share your solution with others who does not have FileMaker Pro, you must compile your solution. Problems starts here, you can see Save As PDF option dissappears in Runtime.

A simple solution for this issue is PDF Drivers. You can print as PDF with Adobe Acrobat Professional version. But it is expensive to buy if you only want to save as PDF. I am using small PDF driver software to do this. Cute PDF is a free application can print your pages / reports as PDF. I am currently use it and I like it. Click here to download Cute PDF Writer.

After installing Cute PDF you will see Cute PDF option in print dialog box. Select Cute PDF and print your report in PFD format.

Integrate Flash file into FileMaker Pro

This example shows animated buttons and animations can used directly in FileMaker. Web viewer can solve this types of missing features of FM by the capabilities of Adobe Flash (swf) Files. I will add additional usage of web viewer later.

Click here to download example file for windows (setup file - runtime)

Click here to download example file for mac (zip - FileMaker Required)

(The example is Turkish, small application shows soccer scores in Turkey league)

Hex2RGB ( hex ; delimiter ; alert )

Description :  Converts hex color codes to decimal RGB

Example : Hex2RGB ( "0CAB10" ; "-" ; "Hex is written wrong" )

Result : 12-171-16

Parameters : hex, delimiter, alert

Function

Let (

// Input value check

chex = Upper ( Filter ( hex ; "0123456789aAbBcCdDeEfF" ) ) ;

If ( Length ( chex ) = 6 ;

// RED

Substitute ( Middle ( chex;1;1) ;

[ "A" ; 10 ] ; [ "B" ; 11 ] ; [ "C" ; 12 ] ; [ "D" ; 13 ] ; [ "E" ; 14 ] ; [ "F" ; 15 ] ) * 16 +

Substitute ( Middle ( chex;2;1) ;

[ "A" ; 10 ] ; [ "B" ; 11 ] ; [ "C" ; 12 ] ; [ "D" ; 13 ] ; [ "E" ; 14 ] ; [ "F" ; 15 ] ) * 1

& delimiter &

// GREEN

Substitute ( Middle (chex;3;1) ;

[ "A" ; 10 ] ; [ "B" ; 11 ] ; [ "C" ; 12 ] ; [ "D" ; 13 ] ; [ "E" ; 14 ] ; [ "F" ; 15 ] ) * 16 +

Substitute ( Middle (chex;4;1) ; [ "A" ; 10 ] ; [ "B" ; 11 ] ; [ "C" ; 12 ] ; [ "D" ; 13 ] ; [ "E" ; 14 ] ; [ "F" ; 15 ] ) * 1

& delimiter &

// BLUE

Substitute ( Middle (chex;5;1) ;

[ "A" ; 10 ] ; [ "B" ; 11 ] ; [ "C" ; 12 ] ; [ "D" ; 13 ] ; [ "E" ; 14 ] ; [ "F" ; 15 ] ) * 16 +

Substitute ( Middle (chex;6;1) ;

[ "A" ; 10 ] ; [ "B" ; 11 ] ; [ "C" ; 12 ] ; [ "D" ; 13 ] ; [ "E" ; 14 ] ; [ "F" ; 15 ] ) * 1

// Alert if input is miss-typed or wrong

; alert ) )

Detailed Description : Hex2RGB function converts standard hex color codes (generally used in html web sites) into RGB. Hex color codes is form of 6 or 7 (with #) characters. R is first two characters in hex format, G is next  two characters in hex format and B is last  two characters in hex format. For example "#FF00AA" is converted as decimal RBG as following : (171;205;239)

Zebra Patterned List View

In FileMaker Pro you can alter even lines background color in list view. Zebra patterned list views makes easier to browse records in list view. You can follow  steps blew to do this;

Step 1: Enter layout mode (In any list view layout)

Select Layout Mode from View menu (Cmd + L | Ctrl + L )

Step 2: Enter part set up of body

Double click on body part or select part setup from layout menu and double click body

Step 3: Check "Alternate Background Color"

Use soft color suitable for background

Step 4: Select color

The color you have selected will be display in even rows

Step 5: Click OK to exit, enter browse mode

Select Browse Mode from View menu (Cmd + B | Ctrl + B )

It's done!

Note: This feature is added to FileMaker Pro 8

May be you know, but may be not!

FileMaker is elegant application. It is easy and user friendly. Some features (however easy to use) they might be overlooked. In past I don't care to write them here. I decided to write them here. May be you know or not. I will tag this types by "MYKMN"

The first entry is here: Zebra Patterned List View

Time for 9 Campaign

FileMaker has recently started a campaign to update to version 9. Limited time offer gives chance to save up to 100$. Discount is only applied to upgrade box. How ever this campaign decrease licensing cost it is not enough. Similar campaign (nearly ends) was kicked off by Winsoft for Centeral Europe, Middle East and Asia customers. Its offer up to 40 percent discount on new software licenses. You can purchase FileMaker license from local dealer or filemaker bussiness alliance partner in your site.

These campaingns are happy news but not enough for us, developers. FileMaker license fees are at high level. For a solution will be accessed by five person, my customer should pay approx. 1200$ only for license cost. This affects on competitiveness negatively for small-business solutions with FileMaker.

I think most of the developers have same problem. I am still waiting patiently and hopefully new product that only runs as client (no layout editing, no define fields, no script maker) to solve multi user high license costs...

Bin2Dec ( bin ; dmy )

Explatation : Converts binary number to decimal number.

Example : Bin2Dec ( 1100101010110001 ; 0 )

Output : 51889

Parameters : bin, dmy

Custom Function 

Right(bin;1)*2 ^ dmy +If(Length (bin) > 0;  Bin2Dec( Left(bin;Length ( bin) -1);dmy+1))

About this blog

FileMaker, the user friendly database application. This blog will be focus FileMaker Pro (FMP). Some tips & tricks, techniques, examples, explanations, comments and the things I do not know now. Some post will be exact translation of some of my posts in filemakerkullaniyorum.blogspot.com (Turkish).

I have been developing FileMaker solutions for more than 10 years. FileMaker is Apple based application. Like an Apple product, it endear it self. Like most of FM user I like to develop with FileMaker although some missing features that developers expecting for years. Every newer version close this missing feature gaps. But there are still gaps...

In addition, I am planning to publish visitors questions in Q/A part. I am waiting your questions, comments and any other request.

Although this blog is not aimed profit, I may use google ad-sense program. Please do not hesitate to notify me inconvenient ads.

Legal Note: All brand names and trademarks are the property of their respective owners.