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- Provides: Flat and relational database creation and management
- Format: DVD
- Developer: FileMaker, Inc.
- Minimum Requirements: G3 PowerPC-based or Mac Intel-based processor, Mac OS X v10.4.8, QuickTime 6.4
- Processor Compatibility: Universal
- Retail Price: Pro 9: $299.00, $149.00 upgrade; Pro 9 Advanced: $499.00, $299.00 upgrade
- Availability: Out now
- Version Reviewed: 9.0.1
Upgrades of software that have been around for a while provide a unique set of confusing issues for reviewers because a great program with varying levels of "new features" is still a great program even if some of the new features are of limited value to some users. An extra complication comes in if there are fantastic new features for some users and nice new features for others. This brings us to FileMaker Pro 9, the best database program for Mac users, with some fantastic new programming features and some nice new features for those who use FileMaker databases created by someone else. If you do not have FM Pro, this review may make you want to run out and purchase it. If you have FM Pro and write databases with it, you probably will want to run out and purchase it. If you have FM Pro and use it to work with databases created by others, well, you may or may not be motivated to purchase the new version. [And, if you upgrade to Leopard, you may have to upgrade, which is a whole different issue.] Regardless, please work with me and I'll try to detail all of this below.
To start with, if you do not know about FileMaker Pro specifically, or databases in general, a brief introduction: At a basic level, a database is a program that lets you enter data and, later, find that data. In addition, you should be able to manipulate that data to create reports and/or collections of the data and perhaps calculations and charts from that data. You can make a Word or Excel document work sort of like a database. That is, if you have a list of names of your club, you can easily do a search for a given name and you will quickly find that person and all of his details. However, what you cannot do with either is find and create a unique list of those who live in a given city or who paid this year's dues. Nor can you easily create a unique list that only shows phone numbers. As an added comparison, think of a collection of business cards. You want to place the business card of a friend who's also your plumber in your business card container. Do you place the business card under the person's first name, last name, the name of his business, "p" for plumber, or "h" for house repair? With a database in general, or FileMaker in specific, it doesn't make a difference because you can do a search for any of those and find that one person in a click or two. In addition, if you wanted to see only those in your database of those who do "house repair," you can. In short, a database is a collection of fields of data that you can manipulate to present only the information you want in any way you want.
In fact, typically, the biggest limitation with databases is your imagination and/or your knowledge of how to get to where you want to go. And FileMaker tries very hard to give you all that you need to get there.
When you first start FileMaker, it's like starting Word, Excel, InDesign, Dreamweaver, or any other program that is used to create something else. However, FileMaker is a bit different in that a database functions by way of data placed in fields; if you do not have a database created, there are no fields to place data into. Thus, the first job with FileMaker, if you are not given an already-created database, is to either alter a pre-made template database into something that you can use or to start a brand new database and create your own fields for your specific need.
[FileMaker is also a lot different in one other aspect, and that is that there is no "Save" command. FileMaker saves when it wants to. In fact, FileMaker saves very often, so your chance of losing data is essentially nonexistent.]
One important piece of good news is that FileMaker 9 is backwards compatible to previous versions all the way to FileMaker 7. That means you can open FileMaker 9 database with earlier versions with no problems (except the Tab Panel Control feature implemented in FileMaker 8) and you can open any database from FM 7, 8 or 8.5 in FM 9 with no problems. By the way, this review covers both FileMaker Pro and FileMaker Pro Advanced. Everything that is discussed is relevant to both versions except for features identified as restricted to the Advanced version. While you can create databases with either version, the Advanced version has several features to assist the creation of databases as well as the ability to create standalone versions of a database that can be used by people who do not own a copy of FileMaker. More on this later.
Because the big news in FileMaker Pro 9 are the database creation features, I will start with my favorite. For me, the really big news is that you can have multiple scripts open. That is, you can now open multiple scripts at a time in either the same database or even scripts from other databases. In FileMaker, scripts are essentially macros but some of these are macros on steroids—they can be very very powerful. In the past, if you created a script in one database and wanted to re-create that in another database, you first needed to examine what you did in the first place and then try to recreate that in the 2nd database. To do this you needed to:
- go to database 1
- open the script window
- open the script
- look at the whole script or specific parts therein
- take a screen shot, try to remember what you needed to see, fiddle around with it, whatever you need to do
- close the script
- close the script window
- go to database 2
- open the script window
- open the new script
- work in the new script.
Forgot something? Something not work? Then repeat the whole process in reverse and then repeat it forward again. Yes, it got tedious.
Now, with the new Manage Scripts window, seen below, you open this window and open one or more of the scripts in that window. And, if you have another database, you can open that Manage Scripts window and open as many of those scripts as you want. I've worked with FileMaker for just about twenty years and this one feature makes this update worth updating for.
As seen above, not only can you open multiple scripts, but you can also group scripts into Folders for better organization. Again, this is just fantastic because now if you have a lot of scripts you can group them into logical sets. And, for the icing on top, if you go to the drop down menu at the top of the window, you will see All scripts and (in the example above) you'll see the two Groups: Payments, and Sort Names). If you select either of the Group options, you will only see the scripts within that folder. And if you remember the name of your script, you can type it into the field next to the magnifying glass and it will be exclusively shown in the Manage Scripts window. My only disappointment with this window is the "New Separator" option in the drop down menu. What it provides is exactly the same thing as if you created a new script and gave it a hyphen (-) as a name. While the hyphen does break up the visual clutter, it would have been better if we didn't have to see the little script icon and just have just a separator between the scripts. Admittedly, this is a small complaint.
To complete this window, let me point out that along the bottom, if you simply click the "New" button you start a new script, the "Edit" button is no different than double-clicking any script, "Delete" is pretty obvious (and there is a warning window to catch sloppy mouse work). To the right of the Delete button is a "Duplicate" button, then there's a "Print" button. To the right of that though is another fantastic addition, the "Import" button. This lets you import scripts from other databases, which is oh, so fantastic. But not only can you import scripts, you can also simply copy and paste from one Manage Scripts window to another. Lastly, there is a "Perform" button that lets you run scripts so you can test a script without having to close everything up. All of these changes remove one tedious aspect of working with scripts.
For the ubergeek programmers, there have been significant improvements in how FileMaker works with SQL databases via ODBC. No longer are you limited to static presentations of this data, but now you can have live access. These now appear as a regular Filemaker table (a database of data, not a table in the "MS Word structure of the word). These connections can be read only or read/write. This means you can have a FileMaker "face" to an enterprise back end.
Specific to the FileMaker Pro Advanced, the Script Debugger has changed a bit to take better advantage of the Manage Scripts window. In the past, the Script Debugger option was a check mark against the menu option in the Tools menu. When you selected a script, the Script Debugger window popped up and disappeared when you finished working on that script. Now, when you select the Script Debugger option, the Script Debugger window pops up and remains.
There has been a cosmetic change with the Script Debugger window with separating the icon controls into logical groups. There has also been a change in the icons, but no (apparent) change in function.
A great new addition to the Script Debugger is the linking of error codes to the Help Viewer. If you look at the image above, you can see in the region between the two windows the text "Last Error: 105" If there is an error in the script, as there is here (caused by the "Go to Layout [codes::second serial number]"), click on the error code (in this example you'd double-click on the "105"). Once the error code is clicked, the Help Viewer will open (if it isn't already), leading you directly to the page with the error codes. You will probably need to scroll down to see the problem.
Back to both versions of FileMaker Pro:
As an aside on the Help file mentioned above, for too long FileMaker has used Apple's Help Viewer as its online help file. There is a PDF manual, but occasionally it refers to the Help Viewer for more detailed help. I am not a fan of the Help viewer because of the inability to open multiple windows, and very limited control on what you are viewing. I would love it if FileMaker is going to depend on an online Help file for that to either be a better PDF manual, an html Help or, best yet, a FileMaker based help file. Yes, I can dream...
One of FileMaker's annoying habits in the past has been simply starting the program on your computer; FileMaker has traditionally opened to the "Open file..." dialog window, leaving the FileMaker icon in the Dock to bounced and bounce. You either had to navigate to the file you wanted or to click the Cancel button. There was/is an Open Recent... option in the File menu, but you couldn't access that until you canceled this Open file window. If only that "Open file..." window wouldn't open...
New with FileMaker Pro 9 and FileMaker Pro Advanced is the Quick Start window. While start windows are not a new concept, FileMaker's Quick Start creates a good launching point to start a variety of operations. As seen below, there are three main options with the Quick Start window. Starting from the top, from the "Create Database" mode, you can either start a new, empty database or select from one of 30 pre-made databases that you can customize to your needs. [Besides customize, you can also do (what I call) a database autopsy. That is, you cut into the database and see how it tics so you can utilize the techniques found in databases of your own creation.]
The Open Database option lets you look at "Recent Files," which is the same list as if you selected "Open Recent..." in the File menu. Or, if you click on any database in the Recent Files and then click on the "Add to Favorites" button (not shown the screen shots presented), they will show up on the Favorite Files (local) button (or Remote button if the database is on a server). Any item in the Favorite option will not get pushed off if you open a bunch of other databases.
Lastly, the Learn More option on the bottom left (seen two images above) provides one with direct access to various PDF manuals installed with FileMaker, to a variety of web based support and to help sites, including a few videos from Lynda.com. Lastly, one can interact with FileMaker Inc. for registration, feedback and the various FileMaker forums out in the web.
One curious difference between FileMaker's Quick Start window and those used by (say) Adobe, is that Adobe's are always in your face, sort of like Donkey in Shrek going "Pick me, pick me!" FileMaker's Quick Start goes away after you've selected something, and the only way to bring it back is to select "New Database" from the File menu or to click on the Open document icon in the Toolbar (the leftmost icon that looks like a generic page). [There is no key command to do this (e.g., Command-n), which is the usual mechanism to bring up a new document in most other programs. Command-n is reserved in FileMaker for a New Record within any database.] One interesting limitation to the new "Open New..." window is that if it's open, you can't double-click on a file in the Finder. If you want to open a FileMaker document from the Finder and the Quick Start menu is open, you must first close the Quick Start window.
Another big improvement is the Undo/Redo functionality. While you still cannot undo the deletion of a record, many other operations can be Undone or Redone (Command-z, Shift-Command-z respectively). This can also be made as a script step, and, from what I can tell—the manual is a bit hazy on this and it's a bit of a challenge to formally test this—it seems you can undo as many times as your memory can store the information. In earlier versions of FileMaker, the type of operations you could undo was extremely limited and you could only go back one step. Hopefully, in the future, FileMaker will let us get back those records we really really didn't mean to delete. But alas, not in this version.
One of the few new features in FileMaker Pro 9 for the database user are floating and/or resizing palettes. Although this is primarily a "user" feature, it has to be programmed in and cannot be accessed by the user unless they have access to the Layout mode. From what I understand, this has been a constant request to FileMaker for many years. I can understand the value of this to some degree, but overall I see more dangers than advantages. What this does allow is that during layout construction, you can establish how far you want any field to be from the edge of the screen at the time of creation.
An example of how this might be used by the user is if there is a field that the user has filled with just a tad more text than can fit in the visible part of the field. Rather than use a scroll bar to see the rest of the text, the user simply expands the layout to expand the size of the field.
Specifically, below you see a section of a window with text in a field. I've set the field to have a scroll bar and I've typed in a sufficient amount of text to cause the text to require the user to use the scroll bar to see all of the text. However, I only have a small portion of text that can't be seen. Thus, the goal is to let the user take the resize tab on the bottom right of the window and resize the window to let the user see all of the text in that field.
To do this, go into Layout mode and, from the View menu, select "Objects Info." [Note, the first time you open this new palette, it often opens on the bottom right of your screen—you may have to look for it.] New to this palette are the four anchors and four check boxes. These will be grayed out if you do not have an object selected.
After selecting an object, you can click on the various anchors to set it to that aspect of the page. The "rules" for how the boundaries work are a bit curious. Specifically, the top and left side do refer to the part of the layout the field is in and left side of the window. By default, these are already checked. If you do not have these checked, or "anchored," the field will fly all over the page as the user resizes the window. [Thus, these should always be left selected unless you want to play a joke on the user.] The right side, as shown below, refers to the right-most edge of the right-most field. Below, it refers to the right-most region of the "Type" field, including the dropdown arrow. Lastly, the bottom anchor refers to the bottom of that section. That is, if the field is in the "Body" section, the bottom refers to the bottom of the Body section (as opposed to the bottom of the Footer section).
Anyhow, once you set this and go back to either the Browse or Find mode, any fields you've set with this will be plastic, as seen below. What I've done is drag the resize handle down and to the right. Once I extended the resize handle further to the right than the right side of the "Type" field and lower than the bottom of the "Body" section, the field will expand.
The big caveat to this is that when printing, the field reverts to its original size. This could lead to a bit of a concern about user expectations. Consider: Suppose the user opens the field to display that little bit of data than can be seen in the normal shape. When the user is printing the information, he will be frustrated that the text he can see on the screen will not be printed. I would like to have seen some kind of visual cue so that the user could see that the layout will not print as seen. I would also like to see some button or user device to snap the layout to its printing size. This could be done by a script, but that would require the user to not do a Command-p for printing, but rather to only use the Print button that the database creator provided. That's a risky hope. Alternatively, the database creator needs to not use this feature on layouts that are likely (and/or intended) for printing and reserve this for layouts that are only used for examining data in the database. Overall I see this as a nice—but potentially "frustration inducing"—feature.
A very powerful new tool for the programmer to assist the user is "Conditional Formatting." It is found in Layout mode under the Format menu, but isn't active unless you have clicked on a field t make it selected. When you first bring the Conditional Formatting window up, the field is empty. You initiate new ones by clicking on the Add button. Two types of conditions exist: the [Value is...] or the [Formula is...]. Once you decide on which condition you want to work with, you establish the condition.
As seen below, I set up a simple condition that if the "Comment" field contained the word "software," the entire field would appear pink. On the top image below, the field doesn't have the word "software." But, in the image of a different record, it does—and displays a red field.
While this is a trivial demonstration, imagine if you had it set to show accounts not paid (after a given date) or if moneys were positive you could have those fields green and if in deficit they could be red.
If you select Formula is... you have the option to create a standard FileMaker formula. If you've dealt with these you know how extensive that can be.
One problem I do have with this new tool is that the only "conditional" things the Conditional Formatting window shows you is what is applied to a specific field. Thus, you may create 14 "conditional things" for one field, and if you click on any other field you will see "0" conditional things in the window. What I'd like to see is a "master" Conditional Formatting window with a listing of all of the fields that have any conditional formatting applied to them in that database and what the Conditional Formatting events are for each field. Perhaps a double-click on any one of them would bring up the standard Conditional formatting window as seen above.
By the way, one "condition" not available is something like "amount of text is greater than can fit in field." If such a thing as this were available, then my concerns mentioned above about printing would have been easily resolved. This also would help cover those special situations where (for example) an exceptionally long name will not fit in a given field. This would let you quickly find those situations and let you resolve them before a printing issue.
New in FileMaker is Activation. This is one of those "signs of our times" addition to many software companies products, and now FileMaker is joining in. However, as opposed to Adobe (who I feel did a good job of implementing Activation), FileMaker comes up a bit short in a curious limitation. If you are unfamiliar with Activation, what it means is that you have a serial number that is good for two machines. You can install the software on any number of machines, but it can only be active on two. Thus, you can install software on your home, work, and laptop computer, but only two of those can be Activated, and therefore functioning at one time. If you want to use the product on the third, you have to Deactivate one of the other two (from the Help menu) and then Activate the third. In the grand scheme of things this is a very good system. However, with FileMaker there is a glitch in the scheme.
The glitch in FileMaker's Activation becomes apparent when you compare it with Adobe's Activation. Adobe's Activation is to the machine, not to a partition. Thus, if I have Photoshop on two separate partitions on the same computer, they share the same Activation key. FileMaker's Activation seems to be to the partition it's on. Thus, if I place a copy of FileMaker on two partitions of the same computer and activate each, that's my two activations. Where this becomes ugly is if you have Boot Camp, or Parallels on your computer and want to install the Mac version and the PC version on the same computer. Now, let's say you are at work and didn't deactivate your home's FileMaker but you need to run both the Mac and the PC version at work. You can't. You have to Deactivate your Mac version, run the PC version, Deactivate the PC version, Activate the Mac version, etc., etc., etc. [This issue is irrelevant to Adobe as they do not provide a Mac and PC version to the user.]
The only other option is to purchase a second copy or to not toss your previous version of FileMaker so you can use this as your extra copy (and hope that you do not need the new features in FM 9).
Other features exclusive to the Advanced version of FileMaker include the Database Design Report. This feature, accessed via the Tools menu, creates either an HTML or XML based document that has every piece of information about every aspect within any given database.
Once the report is generated (which takes a moment at best), there is a complete report of all of the fields, scripts, layouts, accounts, and other aspects about the database that you view in any browser. The full value of this can be when you need to go back to a database that you created years ago and want to look at how you created the scripts or what fields you had created and what fields were in those various layouts. Another value can be if you make the mistake of not creating passwords to access various functions of the database and pass the database to people who don't know what they are doing and manages to drop fields from layouts and/or change scripts without knowing what they are doing or why. Yes, it's happened to me, and yes, it was a disaster. Now I protect myself both by the fact that I lock some functionality out of databases that I give to others and also that I create a Database Report to remind myself of what I have done on any given database I've created.
The primary difference between the Database Reports from the previous version of FileMaker Pro Advanced and this one is that in the previous version (8.5), unless there was data in a field, there were no border lines around that field. In this version there are border lines around everything, empty fields or not. While the later report did look cleaner, it also was a bit more confusing to follow. I find these reports more efficient and easier to read.
My only complaint with the report generation process is that three different items are generated with this operation: a main document who's default name is "summary.html," a CSS document ("Styles.css) and a folder named after the name of the database itself. If you have a messy desktop and you generate these to the desktop, they are lost. What should happen here (and to every program that generates more than one file in a circumstance such as this) is to self generate a folder and place everything into that one folder. This may be a small complaint, but anyone who's had to deal with missing files on a messy desktop can appreciate this annoyance. [Yes, I know I can always open the desktop file and set it to have recent files on the top in a list view but that's beside the point.]
Menu alteration and creation is about the same in this release, and still needs a bit of work to simplify the creation and customization of menus.
Perhaps the hallmark and main focus point for the Advanced version of FileMaker is the creation of Runtime versions of your database. This used to be a separate application, but for some time has been found as "Developer Utilities..." under the Tools menu. There is no change from previous versions of runtime creation, and I'm only elaborating on it here because—beside the Database Report, Menu creation and the Script Debugger—it's one of the main reasons to get the Advanced version of FM. Here is where you can select which database(s) for which you want to create a "solution.". After you've selected the database, you need to specify what you want done to the database by clicking on the "Specify" button (where I'm pointing with the cursor) seen below.
The most likely option is to create a Runtime solution as seen below. What you are doing here is having FileMaker Pro Advanced create a new application that will (only) run that one database. The application and the database are linked so that you cannot open any other database with that application, nor can you create a new database. However, depending upon what you, as developer, let the user(s) have access to, they can add new fields, create PDF reports, run calculations and all of the operations that anyone with FileMaker can do to run a database. Thus, if you provide only read but no write access, or no ability to create or delete new records, that's what they can or cannot do. In the image below, the Runtime name is the name you are calling the application that can run your database. If you do not provide a custom Closing Splash Screen, there will be a generic FileMaker image.
After clicking on OK, there is a brief pause as the database is generated in the location you specified. A folder with the name you gave for your database application will contain all of the files you need for your database as seen below.
In the upper left is the Runtime version of the FileMaker application. Here, I've called it Codes Application, and it has a forward "button" on it to help signify that this is a FileMaker runtime application. I used Application in the name to help identify that as an application. Below that is a document icon, similar to a FileMaker icon but with a forward "button" on it to help signify it as converted to run with a Runtime application. In the Extensions folder is a Dictionary, so the database maintains its spelling correction functionality and the FMP Acknowledgments.pdf file is a bunch of legal stuff.
Anyhow, you can give or sell that folder to anyone you want, and they can run that database as per the limitations you established. By the way, any runtime database is your responsibility, not FileMaker's, so if the client wants support, that's your job. Thought I'd mention that.
Although any database created in this technique is keyed to work with the specific runtime version, you can open it with a standard copy of FileMaker as well. Thus, if the client wants a new field added, he or she can send you just the database (not the application), you can open that in FileMaker, do what you need to do and send that file back to your client. They replace the copy they have with the revised one you worked on, and they are back to business. The one warning here is that any records they add or alter while the other database is in your possession will not be part of what they get back from you. That is a caution, heed it.
If you install FileMaker in Parallels or Boot Camp, you can also generate Windows versions of your database (you must create a database in the OS you want it to end up with).
Back to FileMaker Pro and FileMaker Pro Advanced
You can now turn off spell checking for any given field. This is also done from the Layout mode either by selecting "Field Control..." from the contextual menu or from the Format menu. This lets you turn off spelling correction for fields that will almost always be considered wrong (like name fields, etc.).
Almost concurrent with my writing of this review was the release of Mac OS X.5, Leopard. There are several issues with FileMaker 9 and Leopard, most of which are addressed by a new update 9.0.2 that can be downloaded here. In addition, a detailed PDF report on updates and changes from this update can be downloaded here. While resolving most of the issues with Leopard, what is very disappointing is that the 9.0.2 update does not resolve issues with IWP, Instant Web Publishing. An update to fix this is currently expected sometime in December. Thus, for anyone dependent upon IWP, you are advised to hold off on your Leopard purchase.
Also, keep in mind that earlier versions of FileMaker will have limited success running under Leopard. More details can be found here, but suffice it to say that only version 8.5 will receive updates to accommodate the new OS. While I'm sure this is frustrating for those who are happy with earlier versions, it's not all that surprising since anything earlier than 8.5 has been out for quite some time and there is little reason for FileMaker to support such old software at this point. This is a common issue that comes up with major OS releases, and Leopard is a major OS release.
Beyond the complications of issues created with Leopard, this is an okay, great, or fantastic update depending on what kind of user you are. Just about all of the updates that effect how a user interacts with a FileMaker database are dependent upon the person creating the database. If you are a general database designer, this update is a wonderful evolutionary upgrade of FileMaker. If you are a high-level database designer, this is a fantastic update as it provides significantly improved connectivity with ODBC, SQL, and mySQL database structures.
Needless to say that although you can open a FileMaker 9 database in FileMaker 7-8.5, any of the new features will not function. But those are the user-based updates like conditional formatting and spell check field skipping. If a designer used the new Manage Scripts window to create a database, the database itself will work just fine in earlier versions of FM Pro. You can see the enigma for updating on this. You will either run off to the store or shrug your shoulders. If you are moving up to Leopard, you are well advised to update your copy of FileMaker. Irrelevant to Leopard, if you don't own a database program and think you could use one, you can't do better than FileMaker Pro.
___________ Gary Coyne has been a scientific glassblower for over 30 years. He's been using Macs since 1985 (his first was a fat Mac) and has been writing reviews of Mac software and hardware since 1995.
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