Learning Claris FileMaker

The most recent update of Claris FileMaker (19.1.2) includes add-ons.

 

Finally. A calendar, a timer, a kanban board, and much more are part of the actual FileMaker product, built as add-ons.

With Claris FileMaker 19, there’s a new world of power opened for us in using web viewer widgets inside our applications.

We can create and use calendars, tables, lists, date pickers, charts, data trees, data maps, and thousands of other widgets.

 

With Claris FileMaker 19, there’s a whole lot more power given to the problem solver with JavaScript in FileMaker.

Claris FileMaker 19 is the biggest release since FileMaker 7.

 

It has the potential to change how we think about and build FileMaker applications forever.

 

There are a host of new features for FileMaker users and advanced developers can now use powerful technologies, like machine learning and JavaScript to extend the platform in new directions, but it is the ability to build and share feature rich Add-ons that turns FileMaker 19 into the first Open Platform release for FileMaker.

This is what an Add-on looks like

The little clip above shows a Calendar Heat Map Add-on being dragged out onto a layout, just like it was any other FileMaker control.

Once in browse mode the Add-on just works. It is responsive and interactive. It shows the number of events that have been scheduled on each day for a given 3 month block of time.

You can drill into a FileMaker Card window to get more detail on each days’ events. This Add-on is a mixture of JavaScript and FileMaker. The user of the add-on doesn’t need to know anything about how the add-on is constructed to use it. The add-on builder feature has been released as a Developer preview in FileMaker 19.

The Calendar Heatmap was built by our own Jeremy Brown using an open source add-on framework we created at Geist Interactive as part of a collaboration with iSolutions and Claris Engineering teams.
Wasn’t 16 the biggest release since 7?

Yes, it was… but that was 4 versions ago.

In my FileMaker 16 release blog post, I focused on the integration features we gained.

It was the first release that natively supported connecting to the global API economy.

Overnight, we gained access to thousands of APIs and services that are available over the internet.

Just a few years later and just about every project we do connects to one or more APIs, and JSON has become the de-facto way of passing data around in our solutions.

All of this was great, but it but it didn’t change what we could do on a FileMaker layout.

We could reach out and interact with the internet; we could even pull data back into FileMaker and display it.

But FileMaker 16 didn’t make it any easier to build rich interactive experiences inside of FileMaker.

We couldn’t use calendars, or photo editors, or kanban boards or D3 charts any easier than before.

The calc engine and script engine were also out of reach, unless you opted for plugins, which required a C developer to write and didn’t work on the whole platform.

FileMaker itself remained mostly closed.

All of that begins to change with FileMaker 19.

Open Platform

The most powerful and popular software platforms in the world have ways to extend their core capabilities.

Some of these platforms like WordPress are free and “Open Source.”

Others, like SalesForce, are closed-source and commercial.

Either way, they are “open” to modification, extension and hacking. This critical capability lets users, developers and 3rd party vendors build unique value on top of the platform which they can either share for free or make into a commercial business.

The easier it is for people to share code and for vendors to make money, they better it is for everyone.

Open platforms also spread out the effort and innovation in an ecosystem efficiently.

The main vendor, in this case, Claris, gets to spend more resources building the core features that only it can build.

And customers, developers and third parties have the ability to get close to the problems that may only matter to them or to a smaller subset of customers.

As a result they will produce features that really work for them.

Importantly, that doesn’t mean that Claris isn’t going to build any more layout objects.

Or just decide to let vendors do everything.

They know that won’t work either.

It’s a balancing act.

But having an Open Platform makes the whole environment much more agile.

We’ll cover the specific features that power the Open Platform in detail in future blog posts and podcasts, but let me just touch on some of the highlights.

Better JavaScript Integration

Although we have had several JavaScript based applications in the market for years, these were quite difficult to build, especially on Windows, and they barely worked, if at all, on FileMaker WebDirect. FileMaker 19 has a new script step, “Perform JavaScript in Web Viewer.” This step lets you call INTO a JavaScript Application running in a Web Viewer from a FileMaker script. Now we have a native way of talking directly to these Apps. And it works on the entire FileMaker platform, including Web Direct.

We also get the reverse. Any JavaScript application running in a Web Viewer has a new function added to the environment; “FileMaker.PerformScript”. Any JavaScript application can use this to call out to FileMaker and tell it do things or to get some data. We have built some libraries and a template that we’ll link to below that add further sugar over these low level calls to make it even easier.

Now we can leverage the thousands of commercial and free Javascript Libraries and modules directly into our FileMaker layouts. You will not be able to tell what is FileMaker and what is JavaScript.

Machine Learning

FileMaker 19 brings CoreML machine learning model to the platform. You can do sentiment analysis, image classification, predictive analysis and a whole lot more. Apps that can look for signs of projects running into trouble in email conversations, or get better at producing estimates and bids that don’t expose your company to too much risk, or figure out how much stock to order are now within our grasp.

These are just a couple of the new features that allow developers who already know how or want to learn how to create JavaScript applications or machine learning models can open up FileMaker and extend it for their unique requirements. All this is great, but what if you don’t want to learn JavaScript or machine learning? Does that mean you are getting left behind? The answer is a most emphatic, “NO!”

Add-ons. Shareable and Re-useable Bundles of Code

Even if you don’t want to know anything about JavaScript or Machine Learning, you will still be able to benefit from these features. Because others will use the feature to create add-ons that you can install into your solution, and use much like you use any other FileMaker layout control or function, just like the video above.

One other important note: Add-ons don’t have to be made with JavaScript.

They can be made with a collection of regular FileMaker objects as well.

ModularFileMaker.org

In 2013 I launched ModularFileMaker.org.

This was an attempt to build modular and reusable chunks of FileMaker code.

We did the best we could back then with the tools we had.

But I knew we needed some changes from FileMaker to really make the modular dream work.

Over the years we have received some of those changes; JSON, Insert from URL, Card Windows, for example.

But now FileMaker 19 brings the last big one to the table, the Add-on.

A way to organize code so it can be shared, maintained and even sold.

It’s the key piece because it lets us take complex modern work flows and package them up so others can use them, fulfilling Claris FileMaker’s ultimate purpose of making complex tech available to everyone and giving power to the problem solver.

It’s early.

We don’t yet have everything we need, but Oh Boy do we have lots of fun new stuff to play with.

This will be the last of my yearly release blog posts since this is the last yearly FileMaker release. But I am sure I’ll find another reason to blabber on. But either way, thanks for reading all the way through.

All the best,

Todd

 

Resources and Links

We’ll be posting lots more materials over the next week.

Check back for update.

 

Below are links to two github repos that contain useful stuff for FileMaker/ JavaScript developers.

Please post questions and comments to those repos.

Starter Template for building react based FileMaker Addons

https://github.com/geistinteractive/cra-template-fmw

Low level JS code useful for any JS Stuff

https://github.com/geistinteractive/fmw-utils
May 20, 2020/by Todd Geist

We are very excited to release the prettiest new feature to hit FMPerception, since it’s initial release.

It’s called the Call Chain Diagram.

 

You can use the diagram to easily visualize all the scripts that call or are called by a given FileMaker Script in an interactive 2D chart.

There’s a lot to talk about in the FileMaker world. And coming soon, the list of topics will explode as we welcome Claris Connect into the fold.

Luckily there’s another avenue to discuss all things related to FileMaker: The Context Podcast.

We at Geist Interactive are excited to launch a weekly podcast in which we talk about all things FileMaker and the context of those things in FileMaker.

You need Dev Ops for FileMaker

A Developer Operations (DevOps) tool helps the developer to automate the tedious and error-prone processes of deploying, migrating and monitoring solutions.

 

In the case of data migrations, a DevOps tool must provide the ability to:

Completely automate the process of moving files from one server to another
Configure automatic data migrations using the FileMaker Data Migration Tool
Add your custom logic so you can perform the types of migrations that you need to execute

With a DevOps tool, you will be able to create full automatic multi-server deployments and data migrations that run at the push of the button, or on a schedule.

Otto does all that and a whole lot more!

The transactional method of working with records has one goal: to ensure all changes to records (additions, changes, or deletions) are done at once or not at all.

We’ve talked about this before.

The transactional method prevents some records in a discrete set (such as invoices and invoice line items) from being changed while others are left in a previous state.

We’ve reviewed in the past how to create records in a transactional method (here and here).

Now let’s turn our attention to the FileMaker transactions and editing records.

Review the Concepts
There are a few important points about the transactional process.

If we keep these ideas in mind, we will design a workflow that works for FileMaker transactions editing and continues the trend of data confidence. 

 

Read more about transactions on the blog ...

WidgetStudio, the best tool out there to create and customize and deploy FileMaker web viewer widgets, is only a few months old.

Yet its creator, Carson Lind of Eagle Optimizations, has added many new features to the dev tool.

His goal was to make it easier to create and customize widgets.

And he did so with the three big new features: Using an External Editor, Offline Compiler, and Easy Access to Variables.

 

Read more on the blog

Geist Interactive recently released an exciting new product for FileMaker developers called “WidgetStudio”.

WidgetStudio makes it easier to use common JavaScript/HTML/CSS interface objects within FileMaker.

It utilizes the FileMaker web viewer.

Similar to LuminFire’s fmFlare, WidgetStudio is a modular product.

It consolidates common code in one place and makes it easier to edit, use, and distribute.…

 

Read more about WidgetStudio for FileMaker – Integrating Javascript Elements Easier

DevOps (as we call it) is anything that will help automate the processes you have to go through when you have to manage a FileMaker Server and FileMaker Applications.

Otto is easy to install on your FileMaker server machines.. And once on the machines, Otto provides many features for the developer:

- Automated Data Migration
- Proxy – API keys
- Config settings
- a Developer API

These features and processes are available via your favorite browser.

Geist Interactive and Carson Lind of Eagle Optimizations, LLC is proud to introduce WidgetStudio – FileMaker WebViewer Widgets that everyone can use.

 

WidgetStudio makes it easy to use, design and share powerful interface widgets, like calendars, gauges, charts, and timers.

Pick from the constantly growing set of included widgets or build your own.

Freely share them with your customers or friends.

 

ProofGeist design, build, and orchestrate systems for teams who want to do great things.

 

This channel is set up to demonstrate great things in the Claris FileMaker platform using all the technologies available to us.

 

This begins our JavaScript-in-FileMaker learning path.

 

Start here, as there's lots of set-up information.


Find all the videos and the downloadable file here:
https://www.geistinteractive.com/js-learning-path-2/

Taking Add-ons Over the Finish Line - JEREMY BROWN & TODD GEIST:

With FileMaker 19.1 comes a powerful update to how we create apps. Add-ons are complete install-and-drop packages of functionality for FileMaker custom apps, and they bring more power to the problem solvers (us).

 

From now on, we FileMaker developers will use add-ons as part of our work.

 

Need a calendar? Grab a Calendar add-on.

 

Need a progress bar? Install one and drop it into the corner of the screen.

Geist Interactive teamed up with Claris to produce a webinar focused on what JavaScript Can do for your FileMaker Apps.

 

We also discussed how JavaScript fits perfectly into the FileMaker 19 Open Platform Release.

 

Below are a list of resources, next steps and other online resources for people who attended the webinar.

 

Here’s the video : https://youtu.be/JXfOJGPosjw

Claris FIleMaker 19 introduces more complete functionality for using JavaScript in FileMaker.

This new feature set solves almost all the past issues.

The Context Podcast

FileMaker Developers are all about The Context.

 

And now they have a podcast dedicated to exploring the Context of not just the Relationship Graph, but everything else related to the Workplace Innovation Platform.

 

...

We’ve put together countless videos that walk through almost every part of the session.

 

Anyone now can ‘attend’ the session by reviewing the following pages and information and following the videos and downloading the playground file..

 

This is good.

There are videos that describe what we did in the session.

You can now watch the FileMaker and JavaScript training session at your leisure. You can rewind, fast forward, skip, and pause the videos as you work through the examples.

 

Isn’t that awesome?

 

...

The FM Web Viewer Bridge code is useful in any custom app. Learn how to extract the JavaScript code and the Bridge scripts in this post.

...

 

Companies today have a mishmash of apps and services that they try to string together into some kind of cohesive whole, but duplicate data exists in many apps. Information needs to move from one application to another with custom transformations unique to business processes, and somehow they need to extract valuable business intelligence.

Who designed this mess?

How did we get here?

 

Wouldn’t it be better just to build a big monolithic application so we could avoid the chaos?

 

Read more on the blog post ...

FileMaker 18 ups its game even more with a whole set of script steps (and a few functions) that allow us to write data to an external file.

This can be done without an export. There’s a lot of potential in this FileMaker write data workflow.

FileMaker 18 is another important step for the FileMaker Workplace Innovation Platform.

It has a nice collection of new capabilities and features that make our jobs as Workplace Innovators even easier.

But I like to take these now yearly releases as an opportunity to step back, look at the bigger picture and fit this release into the broader trends that I see both inside the FileMaker and community and in Workplace Innovation in general.

 

WidgetStudio gives all FileMaker developers a break.

The dev tool solves a simple or complex FileMaker use case by making a web viewer widget that just works.

It saves the developer brain power, frustration, research, and lots of trial-and-error.

There are useful widgets available right now in WidgetStudio, and many more on the way.

The tool was developed by a FileMaker developer.

It is designed to give FileMaker developers the most FileMaker value add to their development of client custom apps.

The benefits to using WidgetStudio are legion:

You can solve a use case faster.
- A widget brings a lot of functionality and modern user-interface elements.
- The deployment process is painless
- There’s little to no testing involved.
- The widget you employ can be customized to any client app and data.
- The Widget you employ can interact directly with FileMaker data
- You don’t need to know how any of it works.

Let’s dive in and see how WidgetStudio brings value add to your development process.

 

...

Integrate FileMaker WebViewer Widgets Quickly and Easily

BROWSE WEB VIEW WIDGET LIBRARY
Browse a library of well-created, meaningful FileMaker webviewer widgets for your custom app.

100% CUSTOMIZABLE
Make the widget fit your custom app seamlessly with controls over many options.

DEPLOY THE WIDGET TO YOUR CUSTOM APP
Get the widget to your custom app in one of three ways.