- A recent thread on the FMPug RealTech list discussed the best-practice approach on how to shut down or restart a FileMaker Server machine. The best approach is to first disconnect all clients, close all the hosted files, stopping the database engine and web publishing engine before stopping the FileMaker Server service. The benefit of doing it this way is that it avoids any issues with the OS not waiting long enough before it kills the FMS service. While this sequence can be done manually from the FileMaker Server admin console it can also be fully automated through the FileMaker Server command line interface. Here's a PDF that outlines a VBscript approach to just that. The full explanation and the VBscript is part of my VTC FileMaker Server training tutorial.
- The Web Viewer feature introduced in FileMaker 8.5 offers an interesting way of returning a VBscript result to FM. Up to no we were limited to pasting (not recommended) or triggering an import script in FM. With the Web Viewer we can now have the VBscript write out a small HTML page with the result and then trigger a FileMaker script that scrapes the content of that HTML page into a FileMaker field. Try it out...
Return
Result through the Web Viewer (requires FileMaker 8.5)
- How can you run a script in FileMaker when the script name is variable? Aka: run a script by redirection. The demo here shows how you can do it by going outside of FileMaker and use its ActiveX model to run any script you specify. Windows only, this uses VBscript.
Run
Script by Redirection (requires FileMaker 8)
- Download the Devcon 2006 schedule in FileMaker 8 format here.
- Good maintenance of a FileMaker Server includes frequent checks of the event logs. It's the best way to spot trouble that is coming or that has just happened. This task though can be a bit of a chore and daunting to those who have never administered a server OS before. The file below is a FileMaker 8 solution to that problem. It uses VBscript and WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation) to query the Event logs on a local or remote FileMaker Server machine and extracts all Errors and Warnings for a data range you specify. As a bonus it can also extract and compile basic usage information (who logged in when to what files and for how long). If you want to learn more about VBscript and WMI also download the VBscript repository below.
FMS_eventLogs (requires FileMaker 8)
- VBscript is free, built into the Windows OS and has awesome power. Integrating VBscript with FileMaker is easy (hey, I can do it after all). With VBscript you can talk directly to the OS and have it perform all sorts of admin tasks, or you can talk to other applications and automate your workflow. Microsoft has a great site dedicated to VBscripting and they also offer a collection of useful VBscripts. It's in an Access database and you can get it here. The Microsoft Scripting guys were kind enough however to let me build a FileMaker database with that collection of 2,000 scripts. Enjoy, it's completely unlocked!
VBscript
repository v1.0 (requires FileMaker 8+ for best results).
- Here is a small VB.NET project that uses the FileMaker's 7/8/9/10 ActiveX objects. (Requires Visual Studio 2003).
- You can never have enough backup sets. So how do you maximize the number of available backups without a lot of setup? That's what this article is about: creating hourly backups in a date/time stamped zip file using FileMaker Server's scheduler. Version 2 - updated December 17, 2005.
- A FileMaker 7/8/9/10 script can be set to run with Full Access Privileges. The default state is 'off'. If you are converting a solution from FileMaker 6 you may need to toggle this to 'on' for a number of scripts. Tedious... boring ... But despair not: VBscript to the rescue. The script below will open the script that is active in ScriptMaker, flip the toggle and close the script again, moving to the next script. If you want to do a number of scripts in a row, enter a number when the script asks you if you want to loop... Use HotKeyControl or another tool to assign a shortcut to this VBscript to keep it only a keystroke away.
VBscript to toggle a script's "Run with Full Access Privileges"
- The FileMaker 7.0v3 updater fixes a lot if issues. One issue in particular (issue 1.6.1 in the readme) requires you to make a schema change in files created in 7.0v1 and 7.0v2 before the fix is applied. This VBscript loops through all the FileMaker files you currently have open and creates/deletes a dummy field so that the fix will hold. Please read the comments included with the VBScript (open it in Notepad to do that).
VBscript to change the schema of every open file
- In FileMaker 7 you can comment out parts or all of a calculation. This is great for adding some notes to your calc but also very useful for troubleshooting. FileMaker allows // to indicate a comment line and /* .... */ to indicate a block of comments. Adding /* */ around a bunch of calculations can be tedious though ... Below are 2 VBscripts that will do the work for you. You'll also need a way to assign a hotkey combination to run these VBscripts. I use HotKeyControl XP (freeware) for this so that I can just hit ALT-C to comment out a calc and ALT-U to remove the comment tags.
So how does it work? You're on the field list -> hit the shortcut key you've assigned to the VBscript -> the VBscript opens the calculation window, adds the comment tags at the start and end of the calculation, closes the calculation window and moves to the next field in the field list.
VBscripts to add/remove comments around a calculation.
Note: the VBscript is set to sleep for 100 milliseconds between sending keystrokes to the FileMaker interface. That might be a bit too fast for older computers. You can easily change the VBscript in Notepad to change the 'sleepTime' variable.
- Sometimes it annoys me to no end that when I launch FileMaker it has the network protocol on when I don't want it to or it's off when I want it on. It's a waste of time having to change the network protocol setting, quit FileMaker and relaunch it. So instead of launching FileMaker (5 - 6) I launch this little VBscript that politely asks me if I want FileMaker networking on or off.
VBscript to launch FileMaker with or without the TCP/IP protocol on.
- Here are two White Papers Connecting Data wrote. Please give us some feedback so we can make them even better!
FileMaker Pro vs Microsoft Access: A comparison
(August 2001). Also available from the FileMaker
Inc web site.
Networking FileMaker Pro: A Quick Guide
(May 2001). In cooperation
with Anne Verrinder & Kim Jordan.
- Edit the FileMaker Hosts file using FileMaker Pro (The Hosts file is where permanent host IP addresses are stored). The solution is open and completely cross-platform but needs the Troi file-plugin installed.
SIT
archive
ZIP
archive
- Run any Excel macro from within FileMaker [Windows only]
This
file demonstrates how you can call any Excel macro in any excel file based on
data in FileMaker fields using VBscript This demo requires David McKee's
free File
Toolbox plugin.
- Trigger FileMaker scripts from outside FileMaker Pro [Windows only]
With
a VBscript: can be run locally on a machine or from a website. Truly
powerful. See the readme file for more details. Most Windows
computers are configured to run VBscripts by default.
From
any MS Office application using VBA (Visual Basic for Applications).
You will need Acrobat Reader to view the PDF files. Get it here for free:
