FileMaker Mobile 2.1: pocket your FileMaker files.FileMaker Pro has long been known as an easy-to-use data-base for workgroups. Its user-friendly nature has fostered many loyal fans, so Pocket PC users breathed a sigh of relief when FileMaker Inc. released FileMaker Mobile 2.1--now they don't have to leave their FileMaker data behind when they hit the road. FileMaker Pro is the desktop database part of the FileMaker product family. Coupled with FileMaker Server, it makes for an excellent database platform. Palm users have been able to take advantage of FileMaker Mobile since version 1.0. This evaluation, however, focuses on File Maker Mobile 2.1 on the Pocket PC platform. Getting a feel for FileMaker Mobile You'll find FileMaker Mobile in the Pocket PC Programs folder In a graphical user interface (GUI), a simulated file folder that holds data, applications and other folders. Folders were introduced on the Xerox Star, then popularized on the Macintosh and later adapted to Windows and Unix. In Unix and Linux, as well as DOS and Windows 3. . When launched, it presents you with a list of available databases. From there, you'll see a set of actions, including the ability to e-mall the database file or beam it to another handheld. You open a file by tapping on it. This takes you to a list view of all the records (figure 1). You can sort the records by clicking on the field headers, or by tap-holding a header on the context menu. You can also reorder re·or·der v. re·or·dered, re·or·der·ing, re·or·ders v.tr. 1. To order (the same goods) again. 2. To straighten out or put in order again. 3. To rearrange. v. the fields by dragging the column headers around. [FIGURE 1 OMITTED] Tapping a record displays it in a form view. From the menu at the bottom of the screen, you can edit text, change the view, and manipulate the records. Under Tools, you'll find options for both the list view and the form view (to enable or disable To turn off; deactivate. See disabled. data editing, for instance) and a screen to set field options. Here, you can change field alignments, textcolor, and column width (although you can do that more easily by dragging the column borders). When you have date and time fields, you can configure See configuration. (software) configure - A program by Richard Stallman to discover properties of the current platform and to set up make to compile and install gcc. Cygnus configure was a similar system developed by K. them to show as a date/time picker. For each field, you can set a number of properties, such as: a value list, a custom label (the default label is the field name), whether you can enter data in the field, the field order, etc. This is where you do the layout work for your FileMaker Mobile file. Challenges You can have a max of 50 FileMaker Mobile files on your handheld; each file can have 50 fields and 5,000 records. Each record can store up to 50KB. Stretching FileMaker Mobile to its theoretical max, you could store 250,000 records with a combined total of 12.5GB. Even if you could find a handheld that can store and process that much data, it's more than I'd want to carry around. FileMaker Mobile doesn't support all FileMaker Pro field types; for example, you can only select text, number, date, and type fields. That means no calculation fields, globals, containers, or summaries. The biggest challenge is converting your existing FileMaker Pro solution to a set of flat files that provide easy access to the information the user wants. FileMaker Mobile files aren't relational and there are no scripts available to help you navigate and manipulate data. You'll also have to do some data checking be-fore synching to make sure the data doesn't exceed the size limits I mentioned. FileMaker Mobile 2.1 works with single- and multi user See multiuser. files as long as they're local. Files hosted on a remote machine/server can't be synched. At first glance, this seems like a crippling crip·ple n. 1. A person or animal that is partially disabled or unable to use a limb or limbs: cannot race a horse that is a cripple. 2. A damaged or defective object or device. tr.v. limitation. But, you're usually better off creating a local set of FileMaker Pro files populated pop·u·late tr.v. pop·u·lat·ed, pop·u·lat·ing, pop·u·lates 1. To supply with inhabitants, as by colonization; people. 2. with data from your FileMaker Pro solution anyway, so the inability to synch directly from remotely hosted files isn't much of a problem. Due to the field and record limitations, I (as a developer) wouldn't clutter nay nay adv. 1. No: All but four Democrats voted nay. 2. And moreover: He was ill-favored, nay, hideous. n. 1. A denial or refusal. main solution with the calculations, checking routines, and fields necessary to make it ready for synching. Having the synchronization (1) See synchronous and synchronous transmission. (2) Ensuring that two sets of data are always the same. See data synchronization. (3) Keeping time-of-day clocks in two devices set to the same time. See NTP. routines outside your main solution guarantees you won't have to modify it too much. FileMaker Mobile is bound to gain more features as it matures. If you have FileMaker Pro data bases you want to take on the road, FileMaker Mobile is the way to go. More complex FileMaker Pro solutions may require a bit of work to mobilize mo·bi·lize v. 1. To make mobile or capable of movement. 2. To restore the power of motion to a joint. 3. To release into the body, as glycogen from the liver. . Fortunately, FileMaker Mobile gives you a tool to do that. UpShot FileMaker Mobile's strongest competition is HandDbase because it's also Palm/Pocket PC cross-platform and offers a complete feature set (relational, custom layouts, ODBC (Open DataBase Connectivity) A database programming interface from Microsoft that provides a common language for Windows applications to access databases on a network. , etc.). The heavyweight heavyweight - High-overhead; baroque; code-intensive; featureful, but costly. Especially used of communication protocols, language designs, and any sort of implementation in which maximum generality and/or ease of implementation has been pushed at the expense of mundane databases, such as Oracle, SQL Server An earlier relational DBMS from Sybase and from Microsoft. Sybase introduced SQL Server in 1988 for various Unix versions. In that same year, with help from IBM, Sybase created an OS/2 version that Microsoft licensed and branded as Microsoft SQL Server. , and Sybase, also have Pocket PC versions. For FileMaker Pro users, the trade-off is between spending time "Spending Time" is the first single released by Christian artist Stellar Kart. The lyrics describe the band members desire to spend "more time with God". "Sometimes it’s a real struggle to spend time with God. learning any of the other tools in combination with FileMaker Pro and spending time working around the FileMaker Mobile limitations. If you don't have to calculate data on the handheld and can work around the lack of scripting and relationships, FileMaker Mobile is the logical choice. I'm glad to see it make its entry on the Pocket PC and am looking forward to additional features. ADVISOR EVAL BUSINESS BENEFITS FileMaker Mobile is a no-brainer for FileMaker Pro database users. If you aren't familiar with FileMaker Pro, the combination of FileMaker Pro and FileMaker Mobile is a user-frinedly database option you should consider. (+) Legendary FileMaker ease-of-use (+) Nifty date and time picker (-) No relational databases relational database Database in which all data are represented in tabular form. The description of a particular entity is provided by the set of its attribute values, stored as one row or record of the table, called a tuple. on Pocket PC (-) Limited layout options FileMaker Mobile 2.1 FileMaker, Inc. http://www.filemaker.com US$49 PLATFORMS: Pocket PC 2002, Palm OS 3.1+ Subscribers can read an extended version of this article at http://Advisor.com/doc/11142. Wim Decorte is president of Connecting Data, a company that specializes in database development for multi-user environments, providing analysis and support for the rollout of networks. When not doing that, Wim is busy cranking out Visual Basic code to integrate FileMaker with other applications. http://www.connectingdata.com, wim@connectingdata.com. |
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