FileMaker Overview: Text Functions
When you're learning a new skill or programming language, you don't always know what you might need to know. Such was the case when I received an email asking me to go through the various groups of FileMaker functions. I thought to myself, "In most of my videos, I showcase the use of certain functions, but, I've never really gone through each function one by one."
So, in this video, I do exactly that. I relay my experience and exposure to each of the various FileMaker functions. Starting with the Text group, I walk through each of the functions, or function types, and talk about their use and what I consider their frequency of use to be in daily FileMaker development.
Granted, each solution built in FileMaker is always different and where some solutions may need more math and numbers, others may just store and manipulate data, it's a great thing to know about all the possible functions you can use. And, that's exactly what this video is about!
Comments
Videos
Hey Matt, great video as usual. Its good to see videos for novices like myself.
I have a problem that you would be the best person to ask about.
Im a small business owner (just started) and have no coding experience, however I have managed to teach myself filemaker basics from your video courses, both youtube, online and your ramp up course.
I am trying to build a website but have no HTML or CSS experience and would like to theme my website and possibly a Wordpress blog using my database theme. Filemaker are layouts are CSS/ XML/ HTML?
Is there a plugin/ custom function that can get a Filemaker layout’s HTML and CSS so that I can design a web page layout in Filemaker? Or do I have to design a web direct layout with only text fields and no buttons, swap the container field (pictures) references for picture files references and copy the source code from the web direct layout launched from Filemaker Server.
Hi Matt,
Hi Matt,
great video as ever. It's a good idea to go over all the functions. I guess we all need to do this once a year or so!
Here is a link to the word separators:
https://support.filemaker.com/s/answerview?anum=000023000&language=en_US
basically any space or punctuation is a word separator except for . (dot) and ' (single quote) where there is an alpha character either side: matt.p and Ben's are 1 word each. matt.3 and Ben'6 are 2 words each. I hope this helps.
Update - I have found what seems to be an error in the knowledge base article or a change in behaviour. Tested on FM15 & FM16: if there is a numeric character either side of a . this also returns as 1 word eg 2.1 is one word.
Applications of Text Formatting
This is an excellent review of one of FM's fundamental design issues. I would like to suggest an extension of this session focused on "Applications of Text Formatting". In other words, addressing some of the contexts in which text formatting is used in a database design. I'm working on a billing system, and will share some of the applications that might be of interest to others.
a. formatting data entry — preferred format for data storage; dealing with FM's storage of formatting in fields; scrubbing data files that are submitted to a database.
b. designing data display in portals — pros and cons of using FM's fixed formatting and applying formatting via calculation.
c. using text format as feedback — triggering a change in text formatting for actions like...locked record, line
d. formatting a SQL/virtual list result — a SQL statement pulls data for a Bill line. How to design the text format for the line that will show standard text, bold, and grayed-out text.
e. formatting outbound data — ensuring clean and stable outputs from FM to destinations such as PDFs, print, and various file types (csv, excel, word,etc)
Thanks again for all your excellent instruction!
~David
Vyking Gold
LeftValues, RightValues, MiddleValues
Important to note that the results of LeftValues, RightValues, and MiddleValues include a trailing return, as opposed to GetValue which does not.