Database Reference
In-Depth Information
The calendar itself is a little dynamo. You can click the month and year display at the top,
and you see a pop-up menu that lets you jump to a specific month in the current calendar
year.
Right-click (Control-click) anywhere on the calendar, and the pop-up menu changes to read
“Go to today.” The calendar closes and plunks the current date into the field.
You can also change the month with the right and left arrows at either side. The left arrow
icon moves you backward in time, and the right one moves you forward. Finally, you can
move the highlighted date with your keyboard's arrow keys. Tap the down arrow key a few
times to see how fast time flies.
But if you get carried away playing with the controls (“Is my birthday on a Friday in
2022?”), remember that the calendar's footer always displays the current date. Just click that
display to enter the current date and then click to open up the calendar again. It reorients to
today's date.
Auto-Complete
Auto-Complete is a strong ally, both for database designers who care about data consistency
and for data entry folk who hate to type. Unlike the other field/control styles, you can apply
this little beauty to a regular edit box. Once you've turned on the option to “Auto-complete
using existing values,” the field gets ESP and tries to figure out what you want to enter.
Where do these superhuman powers come from? From that old friend, the field's index.
Auto-Complete isn't a control style in and of itself; rather, you use it in conjunction with
either an edit box or a drop-down list (the option isn't available for other styles). But Auto-
Complete behaves a little differently on edit boxes than it does on drop-down lists. The dif-
ferences are discussed in the following sections.
Auto-Complete in Edit Boxes
To turn on Auto-Complete for an edit box field control, visit the Inspector's Data tab and
turn on “Auto-complete using existing values.” (The Auto-Complete checkbox shows up
only when you have “Control style” set to “Edit box” or “Drop-down list.”)
When you start typing into a field configured this way, FileMaker scans the field's index and
drops down a list of matching entries. There
is no value list
in this case—it always draws
from field values on other records. If you type
T
, for example, then you see a list of entries
that begin with the letter T. If you type
R
next, then the list shortens to only words beginning
with “TR.” Once the list is short enough for you to find what you want, just click the list
item to select it.
