🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1h0ialINN2pp@gap.caltech.edu> kby@cco.caltech.edu (Kimo B. Yap) writes:

   I'd like to make a database in which a company is a record, with contacts
   (a reasonable number) as a field within that record.  Two questions:

   1.  For repeating fields, is there a way to access the repetitions of the
       field other than those that the first "n" specified for the "display
       n of m fields" question?

There is no quick and painless way to select an arbitrary repeat from a
repeating field yet, although I hope that it can be added in to a future
version of FileMaker Pro.  What you can use, though, is the "Go To Next
Field" script command to simulate Tabbing in to the next repeat of a
repeating field.  You can then Cut/Copy/Paste to your heart's content.

   2.  (More important) Is there a way I can make a layout that will print
       one label for each contact from the single company, and do this auto-
       matically for variable numbers of contacts for each company?  That is,
       (for example) if I have two companies (two records) and the first one
       has one contact and the second two contacts, I want to be able to (if
       both of these records are in the currently selected set) get a total
       of three labels out of the same layout.  Although I asked (1) implying
       the contact was a repeating field, it doesn't have to be that way if
       that's the only thing that would prevent me from doing (2).  The main
       criterion is one record = one company = 1 to n contacts.

In short, no.  FileMaker Pro is capable of printing the body of a layout
only once per record, not once per repeating field.  What you can do,
though, is to save your file as a Clone of itself, close the original,
import from the original into the clone, and split the repeating fields.
Now, if you originally had 1 record with 5 employees, you will have 5
records with 1 employee per record.  All non-repepating information will be
copied into each of the five records.  You can set up some scripts to
automate this procedure, although I will warn that this won't be the fastest
beast in the world...    8-)

   PS  I saw something a while ago about being able to select a record based
   (oops, I mean select a layout) based on a field in a record, but I can't
   find the thing I saw; could someone refresh me on this; I thought I might
   be able to switch layouts per record or something like that.

From within the ScriptMaker script editor, you can choose "Go to Layout
[Specified by Field <XX>]", where <XX> is a field.  The article you saw was
probably mine describing how useful this feature can be.

Good luck, and happy FileMaking!

-Nick "At least I don't need a SoundBlaster to play nice music" Triantos

I may work in Claris Technical Support, but not when I'm logged in on
the Internet...