FM 17 Master-Detail Portals

A nice change which they made in FileMaker 17 is an enhancement to the Master-Detail portal. If you don’t know what that is, a Master-Detail portal is a UX design in which a portal is on the left-side (typically) of the screen, and displays all the records for that...

FileMaker 17 – My Apps

You may not have noticed this in FileMaker 17, but there is a very nice new display feature called “My Apps”. Under the File menu there is the usual, “Open”, “Open Recent”, and “Hosts”. But there is also one called “My Apps”. This is basically a ‘favorites’ list. It...

FM 17 – What happened to Pro?

You may have noticed a name change with the new FileMaker Pro Advanced 17 release. FileMaker, Inc, used to provide two varieties of their desktop app: FileMaker Pro which retailed for about $329, and FileMaker Advanced which retailed for about $500. The Advanced...

New FileMaker 17 Feature: Sensors

FileMaker Pro has had support for iBeacons for several years now. But with FileMaker 17, some new functions were added which can capture sensor support from iOS devices. Using a new calculation function mobile apps can capture information from iOS sensors in your iPad...

FileMaker Encryption Options

FileMaker has provided MD5 encryption for several versions now. But with the release of FM16, they have expanded the capabilities of FileMaker with the following functions: 1. CryptDecrypt ( container ; key ) or CryptEncrypt ( data ; key ) — Decrypts/Encrypts...

Instant Database File from Excel

FileMaker Pro has great integrations with Excel. Not a lot of people realize that you can instantly create a FileMaker database using an Excel file. Here’s how; it’s very complicated, so pay close attention: Drag the Excel file onto the FileMaker icon. That’s it! As...