Day 9 - Archives

Our monkey likes to have things together in a compact form. For this reason, it also likes archives and would like to have the option of creating an archive from the children's information and the individual files in the portal. We want to implement this now.

	Day 8 - Weather data with JSON

Today is day 8 of our advent calendar and winter is getting a bit chilly for our monkey. To avoid any surprises at Christmas, he wants to be able to call up the current temperature and weather conditions for each customer in FileMaker.

We would like to retrieve the weather data from a weather database. The weather data can be found on the website openweathermap.org. A few years ago we already made a video about how we implement this with FileMaker nativ functions. Today I would like to show you how this works with the JSON functions of MBS. These have the advantage that they can work very quickly, even with large amounts of data.

	Door 7 - Open Files With Roundabout Route Via Temporary Files

Welcome to day 7 of our advent calendar. Today we would like to add a function to our document portal from day 3. So far we can add documents to this portal via drag and drop, what we are missing now is the possibility to open them from FileMaker.

To do this, we use the MBS function Files.LaunchFile. We can pass a path to this function and the file or folder located at this path is then launched with the standard program provided for this purpose.

But we realize now that we have a container value and no path, how do we do this now? You could perhaps come up with the idea of writing the path to a field when reading it in. This procedure becomes problematic, if we move the original file to a new location and the path is no longer correct. So we have to take a different way. We save the file in the temporary folder and display it from there.

To do this, we first create the path where we want to save the file. We determine the temporary folder with the Folders.UserTemporary function. In the Folders area, we also have further functions for other special folders such as Desktop, Applications or Documents.

Once we have the path to this folder, we still need to append the file name with the correct file extension. The file name is made up of the primary key and the file name. The file name already contains the file extension. We now put together this determined file name with the Path.AddPathComponent function, specifying our temporary path in the parameters.

	Door 6 - Sending Out Wishlist Forms

Today it is time for us to take care of the wish lists of the giftees. We want to prepare a form that we send by e-mail to the giftees, who fill out this form. In a later door we can then read this information from our returned document.

To do this, we first create the template we want to send. To do this, we first need a simple PDF file on which we can position our fields. We have the option of either building this form with DynaPDF, or we can use a pre-designed PDF in which we create fields. I chose this method now. The document was created with Pages and then output as a PDF via the print settings. We want to write several labels in this file. The labels are not only important for the labeling, so that the customer knows which data is to be entered there, but also for positioning the form fields. We want to position these behind the labels.

Now we have everything we need to create our template.

Since we are working with DynaPDF, we first have to initialize it again, as we already explained in door 4.

If [ MBS("DynaPDF.IsInitialized")=0 ]
	Perform Script [ Specified: From list ; "InitDynaPDF" ; Parameter:    ]
End If

	Door 5 - Apple Contacts

Today is day 5 of our calendar and our monkey has a few calls to make on his iPhone. He just doesn't want to keep typing in the number and searching for the customer. It would be much easier if he could simply save the specific contacts in Apple Contacts with the touch of a button. That's no problem, because as a Mac user you can read and write data in Apple Contacts. We use our Contacts functions for this.

But before we can start, we first need to be able to assign phone numbers and email addresses to our contacts. Until now, this was very complicated because we had to leave the giftee layout and enter the data in the respective layouts of the tables. We would now like to change this. To do this, we go to our relationship diagram and double-click on the equal sign between our phone and giftee relationship. Then the Edit Relationship dialog opens and we can make settings. Here we can decide whether we can delete or create data records via this relationship. To do this, we can make a choice in the checkboxes at the bottom. We tick Allow creation of records in this table via this relationship and Delete related records in this table when a record is deleted in the other table for the Telphone table. This allows us to create records in our portal and if a gifte is deleted, the associated telephone numbers are also deleted. We now do the same for the mail addresses.

	Door 4 - Add GTC with DynaPDF

Today I would like to show you a tool that you can use in FileMaker with the MBS FileMaker Plugin: DynaPDF. With DynaPDF you have the possibility to create, edit, merge, analyze or sign PDF documents in FileMaker. DynaPDF offers you many possibilities around the topic of PDF.

Our monkey also wants to use one of these functionalities today. Because today we want to build the possibility to attach user terms and conditions to a PDF document. The user terms and conditions always remain the same and can be attached to any outgoing document, e.g. an invoice. I will show you how this works today in this door.

First we have to initialize DynaPDF, which means we have to tell FileMaker where the DynaPDF function library is located. The files are automatically delivered with the download of the plugin and can be found in Examples > DynaPDF. The files have the extension dll and dylib. Which of the files you need depends on your operating system. If you want to use DynaPDF on a Mac, you will need the path to the dynapdf.dylib file. If we are working with Windows, it also depends on whether we are working with a 32 or 64 bit version. If you are using FileMaker 19 or higher, this decision is easy, as only a 64 system can be used here. In any case, the library has the extension .dll. If you are not sure, just put both dll in the same folder and the plugin will grab the file it needs. The next piece of information we need is the DynaPDF license key. If you want to use DynaPDF in your solutions, you need an appropriate DynaPDF license and an MBS FileMaker Plugin license.

There are four different DynaPDF licenses. Which license you need depends mainly on which DynaPDF functions you use. If you need more information, please visit our website to find out which license is right for you. However, we do not necessarily need a license to try it out, but need to live with the watermark. After we have determined the path to the libraries and the license key, if available, we can now call the DynaPDF.Initialize function. In the parameters we first enter the path to the library and then the license key. If we do not yet have a license key, we pass an empty string here.

	Door 3 - Drag & Drop

Welcome to our third door in this advent calendar. Today we would like to start expanding our database. We want to have the possibility to store additional documents for the giftees. For this purpose, we will create a table with the name Files. This table should store the name of the file, the type and the file itself as a container value. In addition, we also need a field with the Foreigen Key here, because we want to establish a relationship so that the files can also be assigned to the giftee.

Now we have to think about how we want to bring these files into our database. We want to use drag and drop to do this. So we build an area where we can drag the desired file and the type and name are then automatically read out and the file and the remaining information are then stored in a record in the new table. This data record should be related to the giftee that is currently displayed.

We can create drag and drop areas with the MBS FileMaker Plugin. To avoid wasting useful space for a drag and drop field on our layout, we would like to place this drag and drop field as an overlay, i.e. a freely movable area on our layout that can be activated and deactivated by clicking a button. To do this, we first need to create an overlay and then assign drag and drop functionality to it.

So let's start with the overlay first. To do this, we have the functions from the Overlay section. First, we create a new overlay with the MBS function Overlay.Create. This function returns a reference. We also need to specify this reference in the other functions so that we know exactly which overlay in our project the functions should be applied to. Next, we want to determine the size and starting position of our overlay. To do this, we use the Overlay.SetFrame function and, as already mentioned, specify the overlay reference, the position with X and Y coordinates and the height and width of the overlay in pixels. So we want the top left corner of our overlay to be 30 pixels away from the right and top edge. In addition, our overlay should be square and 200 x 200 pixels in size. Our function call looks like this:

Set Variable [ $r ; Value: MBS("Overlay.SetFrame"; $overlay; 30; 30; 200; 200) ]

	Door 1 - The Database

Hello and welcome to this year's MBS FileMaker Advent calendar. This year our logo monkey has turned into a Christmas elf and has to take care of the coordinated distribution of presents at Christmas. What could be more obvious for our monkey than to get an overview with a FileMaker database. Over the next 24 days, we'll show you how to pimp a simple database with the help of the MBS FileMaker Plugin. All you need is to have fun with FileMaker. We'll start by creating the database and work our way through step by step. Even though the advent calendar is suitable for beginners, advanced users and professionals can certainly use some of the ideas from the advent calendar for their own purposes.

So let's start with our first door and thus with the basis for this calendar. Our FileMaker database. Although we provide you with this database, it can be useful to deal with the topic of how such a database can be set up. Initially, we only have a few tables, which we will expand over the course of the Advent calendar. Initially, our database consists of 3 tables. The table with the name of the giftee is our main table in which we find the information about the giftee, such as the last name, first name, date of birth and address. In addition, each recipient has their own identification number that can be uniquely assigned to them. This means that the number exists exactly once for each recipient. In this example, we call it the Primary Key in the table.