File Maker Pro

FileMaker Pro is a huge seller on Windows and Mac. It has a server that runs on Windows, Mac, or Linux. It is marketed as an end-user product, but in fact has a very strong community of developers and is widely used in professional, mission-critical business environments. Version 7 is expected sometime in 2004.

"Simple and fun... Relational has nothing to do with relationships... Not of much use for serious web developers...." Who writes this stuff?

Go to FileMaker.com and get the real story, go to FMForums.com and ask the developers. FileMaker has weaknesses, of course, but it happens to be a great tool for many applications.

-- Tom Fitch

FileMakerPro crashing if a connection to its web sharing service gets cut off is one such weakness.

Prominent DesktopDatabase on the Mac. It is simple and fun, but much of its history was marred by not supporting relationships.

A Windows and MacOsx version is also available. It does support relationships now. When I was a student I made money by 'programming' FileMakerPro for small businesses. -- AlexVanDenBergh

Do you know what version introduced relationships? I believe 3.0 didn't have them...

Whoops, version 3.0 was the first version to be relational. Relational has nothing to do with relationships.

Version 7 finally supports multiple tables in a single file; the previous versions limited one table per file, and your relations would break if you ever moved your table files around to different folders. However the Views are still in the same file as the Tables, so when you want to edit views on a database in production, you have to be very tricky about doing it with a blank test DB with the same schema, and then downing your sever, importing records, making sure default values get set right in the new one, etc. Quite a pain, really.

If you're writing a database-type application to be used by individuals on their own hosts with their own data, for MacOsx, strongly consider just writing a CoreData application with ExCode.

A popular alternative to MicrosoftAccess because it is cross-platform. The US EPA is converting their CAMEO (Emergency Management) software to FileMaker for this very reason. -- SeanOleary

Sean, I've never seen MicrosoftAccess for the Mac. I don't think a current version exists as of 2003. DaveDowling

One thing I really liked about FMP was the ability to quickly lay out input screens and reports just the way I wanted them. If you're entering ten records, you don't care too much what the tab order is or what gets auto-filled-in; when you have to enter or update dozens at a time, every couple of weeks, you start to appreciate easy customizability. And it's still the only tool I've actually seen end-users write (and script) their own reports in.

I think they're now pitching it as a friendly front end for relational databases on the back end -- it speaks ODBC. And (though I haven't tried it) apparently version 5.0 makes it very easy to publish your existing databases on the Web, taking advantage of all that nicely-evolved user-interface stuff you've customized over the years. --GeorgePaci

Using the "Web Companion" plug-in that is shipped with FileMaker Pro you can also query it over http and get xml data out of it. That makes it very easy to build FileMaker driven websites. There is also an easier but much less flexible way for FileMaker Web Publishing, called CDML. Not of much use for serious web developers. --Volker Lamp

CategoryDatabase