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Provides: Create and run databases
Developer: FileMaker, Inc.
Requirements: Mac OS X v10.3.9 or later, G3 processor and 256MB RAM (tentative pre-release requirements - subject to change)
Retail Price: $299 ($179 for upgrade or $149 for academic purchases)

Over the 20 some-odd years that FileMaker has been around, there has been perhaps a handful worth of fingers of major upgrades. FileMaker 3 was one, FileMaker 7 was the latest. While there is little change to the internal database creation and/or design structure, the changes in FileMaker 8 are extensive and broad. FileMaker 8's main goal is to improve user productivity.

For the groups and organizations who have multiple copies of FileMaker, the good news is that—as with the transitions from FileMaker 5 through 6—there was no change in the basic FileMaker document structure. Thus, you can open FM 7 documents in FM 8 and then re-open them in FM 7 with no problems. This means you do not have to upgrade everyone at the same time, but you'll probably want to upgrade everyone eventually.

When you open FM 8, there is no immediate or obvious change beyond a new blue and silver icon (the previous one was gold and silver). But, as soon as you start to work with the program, you'll find a wonderful assortment of productivity enhancements. And that, in a nutshell, is the keyword of FileMaker 8: productivity enhancements. It's like taking the gloves off a watchmaker.

The following is a list and comments on eleven of the big improvements in FM8. Since what might be very important to one person might be just cool to another, there is no intention to place this list in any special order. There are more improvements than this sampling, but these should provide the reader a good idea of the range and level of improvements.

1) Scroll wheels now function in FM8: FM8 now supports scroll wheels. In fact, it does in every direction as it now supports the new Mighty Mouse by Apple. I'm not sure if Apple told FileMaker, "Hey, were doin' this, you guys wanna support it?" or what, but scroll wheel support has been missing for a long time.

Comment: None. This has been a long standing missing feature. It's been too long in coming.

2) Misspelled words can now be underlined: Spell correction has been in FM for a long time, but now you can see the misspelled words highlighted by underlining as you type. This is accessed via File menu -> File Options -> Spelling tab - check option.

Comment: While a wonderful addition, its value becomes limited because underlined words are only underlined if the cursor is in the field. Once you mouse or tab out of the field, misspelled words no longer have the underline. This feature would have much greater value if the underlining could remain.

3) Auto-fill text (via previous entry data): You know how you can have text fill in when typing in MS Word? Well, now this can be done in FileMaker. This is accessed via Format menu -> Field/Control -> Setup (a view of this window can be seen in #10 below).

Comment: this is not a default setting and has to be set for each field. This is a good idea because this feature works best in fields that have limited word entry (like "state" or "city" fields) as opposed to fields with a lot of data. You can either mouse-click on a chosen word option or use the up or down arrow keys-then tap the Enter (or Tab) key to select the desired word. One other benefit is that if you have a capitalized word (e.g., Chicago) and you start to type "ch" and Auto-fill fills out the rest, if you hit tab, the proper capitalized "Chicago" will be filled out.

4) Auto-calendar popup: So you have a date field and you want to be able to easily enter dates? Well, now it's just a pop-up menu away. Like Auto-fill, this is accessed via Format menu -> Field/Control -> Setup - check option. The little icon on the right of the field (seen below) is an option that can be on or off. If calendar pop-up icon is on or off, the user can still enter data manually.

Comment: Like all field outlines, the field disappears if no field is selected. Unfortunately, I'd like the little icon to remain on regardless, but it doesn't. If the icon is on, you have to click on the icon to get the calendar, if off, you click anywhere in the field for the pop-up.

5) New (and improved) Arrange Palette: Before, aligning things meant you first had to go to a "Set Alignment" palette to determine how the objects were to be aligned. Now, you can either:

1. Select directly from the from Arrange menu -> Align;
2. Key commands (Option-Command-arrow keys (no key command for center align)), or
3. By going to the View menu -> Toolbars -> (and select) Arrange

This is the "New and Improved" Arrange palette that pops up to the right of the Standard Palette (it can also float). Previously, the Alignment buttons on this palette were just a faster way to access the same inefficient menu options. Now, in the 6th block of icons, you have direct access to easy alignment options. This toolbar is only visible (and useful) in Layout view.

Going from left to right, the various icons do the following (it's the last block (the 6th) that's new and improved):

1st pair: Group and Ungroup 2nd pair: Lock and unlock 3rd four: Bring in front/forward; send to back/backward 4th single: Rotate 90° CW each click 5th single: Select Objects by Type (have one field selected, click this and all fields will be selected) 6th group of 6: standard align left, top, vertical, etc.

Comment: Why have we had to wait so long for this?

6) Find Matching - Constrain/Extend: Without a doubt, my favorite new feature. This new feature works either in a field with limited words (such as a field for "First Name" or "City") or a field with extended text. The difference is in the former, you only have to click into the field while in the latter you need to select (e.g., double-click) the word in question before proceeding.

[In my description here, when I refer to right-click, I am referring to the contextual menu that one brings up via either clicking the right button on a multi-button mouse or pressing the Control key while clicking on the screen; these are contextual menus. To simplify the writing (and make it easier to read), I will simply state "right-click."]

Let's say you right-click on a first name field that has "Gary" within, and select "Find Matching Record" (see image below), and now you have a found set of all the "Gary's" in that field of the database. What you've just done is the equivalent to selecting the word, copying the word, moving to the Find mode, clicking in the same field, pasting the word, and clicking the Find button.

But wait, there's more: Let's say you want to find only the "Garys" in Chicago. No problem: you've already right-clicked on Gary and selected Find Matching Records. Now, you right click on the City field onto the word Chicago, right-click, and select Constrain Found Set. [What you've done here is open a new find request, placed "Gary" in the Name field and "Chicago" in the City field, and clicked Find. Since there's going to be a fewer number of Garys in Chicago than all the Garys in your database, this is a "Constrained Set."

And lastly, let's say you want to find all the Garys and everyone in California. You start off by right-clicking on Gary and selecting Find Matching Set. Then right click on the State Field that has California showing and select "Extend Found Set." [What you've done here is open a new Find request, placed Gary in the name field, selected "New Find Request" from the File menu and placed California in the State field and clicked the Find button. Since there are a lot more people in California than just the Garys in your database, you will now have a Extended Set.]

This is progressive and continues to work on the same Found Set.

The only caveat to this is that you have to be working with visible words in the respective fields. You cannot right-click in the State field showing Nevada when you want to be selecting California. But, if you are working in a list view, you can always scroll to find your selected words to work with. And yes, this does work with fields in Portals.

Comment: This is going to excite every Power User. In addition, this will do more to teach Boolean logic than any lesson I've seen.

7) Save/Send Records as Excel.../PDF...: Creating new databases, entering data, and finding data are most of what FileMaker is used for. Another goal might be getting the data out. I can't tell you the number of times I've been asked, "Can you send me the output in Word format?" While we are not yet to Word output, two big changes have been created: PDF and Excel.

The Excel output is a time saver addition. Before version 8, one would export some data as a tab-delineated text (after selecting which fields were to be exported), open the text in Excel and proceed from there. Now, all you have to do is select the layout that has the desired fields to be exported into Excel, select Excel from the menu as above, give the file a name, and you are done. Across each column, the top field is the name of that field, and below is all the data from your working found set. If you have a calculation field, all you get is the number (or text) result of the calculation. If you happened to have a text field that should have been a number field (i.e., the Zip code) and open this document in Excel 2004, you will see "error" flags letting you know that numbers were found in text fields.

PDF creation is not new to Mac users, we've been able to create PDF documents from any application ever since OS X was released. [To create a PDF, simply select Print and, on the bottom of any Print dialog, you will see reference to creating and saving your document as a PDF. In Tiger, the interface changed a bit, so I cannot be too specific here.]

However, what couldn't be done on the Mac before (unless you also owned the full Acrobat program) was to set such things as Security or Document specifics. Now, if you are sending a confidential report, you can require a password for opening the document and/or set passwords for such things as the quality of printing and/or how much interaction can be done on the document. In addition you can set such features as compatibility of the document to Acrobat 5 (or 6) and above and how the document opens up on the receiving desktop. The ability to create PDFs is now also available to PC users with all of the extra features just mentioned. Keep in mind that the new, expanded PDF features do not give you the full depth of control that Acrobat Distiller provides.

Comment: Again, these are excellent efficiency tools. The PDF maker is a bigger deal for PC users than Mac users but Mac users should not underestimate the value of having access to the "Document," "Security," and "Initial View" settings. Plus, the ability to easily create Excel documents from FileMaker data is wonderful. Both of these abilities are scriptable.

8) Send Mail: The main value of creating PDFs and Excel documents is to get the data contained therein to someone else, and it's likely you might want to send them to someone via e-mail. Now, you can also let your database control your e-mail activities. As seen in the first File menu screenshot as presented for item #7, just below the "Save/Send Records as" is the "Send Mail..." item. Selecting this brings up the following widow:

The arrow to the right of each field brings up the fields from that database. Assuming you have an e-mail field, you select that field for either the "To:," "CC:" or "BCC:," you create the Subject for the e-mail and place a message, and finally, on the bottom of the window, you can attach the file that you just created with the previous new feature. Once you click on OK, the contents are all shipped off to your e-mail client program, ready for you to click "Send."

Comment: For years I've exported the e-mail data from FileMaker just to do what I can now do directly. Again, another efficiency update. This is scriptable.

9) Export Field Contents: OK, your boss calls you and asks for all the customers you've talked to in the past month. In fact, he wants you to send him the full list. Now, it's no problem. If you look at the Contextual menu in item number 6 in this list, you can see the last entry is "Export Field Contents." From there you get a dialog box asking what do you want to call this text file and where do you want it placed?

Comment: In the past to do this, you'd have to go to File menu ->Export select the one field you want exported as text (from all the fields in the database), select where it was going to be placed, and gave it a name. Now, most of that can be done with a single click and selection, the naming and location of file is the same.

New Tool Buttons: The screen shot below shows the small change to the Tools for Layout creation. There are two new buttons: to the right of the Button button is the Field/Control button, and to the left of Portal button is the new Tabs button.

10) Field Control button: This is intended to help the database designer have more access to all the tools he needs when selecting the type of field to be used. Previously, one would drag out a field onto the working area and then, after placement, change the size as needed. While one can still re-size a field after creation, when this button is selected, one can drag out a field in any shape and size one desires. After the field size is finished, the window seen below pops up. This new window is the previous "Field Format" selection with the added listing of fields to select from. This window can be accessed after using the new Field/Control button by either double-clicking on any field or from the Format menu -> Field/Control.

Comment: While I do like the new Field/Control window--it's good to have access to both field type and selection of fields in the same window. I found it mostly irrelevant to be able to drag out a field to a specific size on first creation--I always end up re-sizing anyway.

11) Tabs: The manila envelope like icon is to create the new Tabs feature. Press on that, and you draw a rectangle out on your screen. Once you do that, a window pops up with an opportunity to name the first tab, and you then press "Create." Then, you can name subsequent fields (I've supplied some simple names on the screen shot below). You supply some straightforward choices (tab justification and rounded or square corners), and click on OK. Then, on each of these tabs, you can place any of the fields you want to place from any table in your database. Then, back in Browse mode, each tab acts like a separate layout. The biggest setback to this nifty ability is that if you open a FileMaker 8 document in FileMaker 7 (the two versions support the same creator) all the data placed on the tabs will appear on the same (single) layout. In other words, this could be a mess. Thus, use of this feature must be limited to users and groups that will not be opening up these files in FileMaker 7.

Comment: Creating nifty tab layouts are visually great, but can be very time consuming to create. The Tabs feature guarantees that all of your tabbed layouts will easily line up and will work just as if they were created in different layouts. Again the warning: this will cause a big mess if opened in FileMaker 7.

To sum up, this is an excellent evolutionary development of FileMaker. Revolutionary it isn't, but few upgrades of any product are. What shines in this new product is user productivity and efficiency. The vast majority of the new features are designed to decrease the number of operations to perform any number of chores. As such, the value of this upgrade is directly proportional to how much you want to work more efficiently.

As this review was based on a pre-release copy of the FileMaker v8, no rating is given.

___________ 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.