Database Reference
In-Depth Information
simply stopped you from typing too many letters, but it doesn't. It's up to you to go back
and delete enough to make it happy.
▪ FileMaker does some powerful computing magic to make these SQL tables work. So if
you have a large amount of data in your SQL table, FileMaker can take a long time to
show you data. Be patient and grateful for FileMaker's efforts.
▪ FileMaker may have trouble performing some finds efficiently. If you include only fields
from one table in your find request, then it should move quickly. But if you search in re-
lated fields, and there are thousands of matches in the related table, FileMaker can take a
very long time to sort things out. If you find that SQL tables aren't performing well, and
you can't simplify your find requests, consider enlisting the help of a SQL expert (or
learning it yourself). You may be able to offload some of the heavy lifting to the SQL
database server, where ready access to the data makes things faster. For example, a com-
plex find in FileMaker could be converted to a SQL view that's super-snappy. This same
advice applies to large summary reports. If you're dealing with lots of records, it may be
faster to let the SQL database server calculate the subtotals and averages for FileMaker.
You can use ESS to get direct access to enterprise data, interact with the back end of your
website, or even replace chunks of FileMaker data with a set of tables that's more open to
other programs. This powerful feature may need a little setup and some new expertise, but if
you have big needs, it can be an incredibly powerful option.
Exporting Data
The Save/Send Records As options (
Save/Send Records As
) make good sense when you just
want to send FileMaker data to an associate. But sometimes your recipient is a computer.
You may send your customer information to a mailing house to be printed on postcards, or
you may need to load it into QuickBooks. In cases like this, you
export
the data.
When you export data, FileMaker needs to know
what
data to export. You tell it with the
“Specify Field Order for Export” dialog box (
Figure 21-10
). The Table pop-up menu shows
you what FileMaker considers the
current layout
—in this case, Invoices. Below it, the field
list shows every field in that current layout. But click the pop-up menu, and you can choose
Current Table, which shows you all the fields in the current table, instead of just the fields on
the layout. You're also welcome to pick other tables from the pop-up menu and see their
fields. When you choose fields from other tables, you're still exporting invoice records. If
you include fields from other tables, FileMaker gets the values from the first record related to
each invoice record.
