Database Reference
In-Depth Information
For the ultimate in specificity, use the Match Entire Field operator (==) instead. Match
Whole Word requires that each
word
in your criteria match one or more words in the field.
Match Phrase seeks to match only what's in the quotes
anywhere
in the field. Match Entire
Field insists that the entire field matches the criteria text exactly. For example,
=Smith
matches “Smith,” “Mr. Smith,” and “Smith-Johnson.” However,
==Smith
matches only
“Smith” in the field and nothing else.
NOTE
Match Phrase doesn't actually match text
anywhere
in the field. The criteria text has to match start-
ing at the beginning of a word. For instance, a search for “Mr. Smith” matches “Mr. Smith” and
“Mr. Smithers,” but if you search for
“r. Smith”
(no M) instead, then you get the “no matches
found” error. To match a phrase anywhere in the field, use the * operator.
Use the “=” operator to find records that don't have data in them. If you need to find all the
records with missing email addresses, just type = in the Email field.
Find Duplicate Values (!)
When you put
!
in a field in Find mode, FileMaker finds records with
duplicate data
in that
field. In other words, it shows only the records that match at least one other record. If you
have only
one
person in your database with the Zip code 90012, and you perform a find with
!
in the Zip code field, then the 90012 person won't appear. That's because “90012” doesn't
match any other record in the database. On the other hand, if you have two people with Zip
code 10025 and four with Zip code 89101, they'll
all
be found because they all have duplic-
ates (each record has at least one other like it). To figure out what's going on, sort your data-
base by the Zip Code field and then switch to List view. Then you can more easily compare
them to the proper duplicates.
Unlike most other operators, the ! operator is always used alone in a field in Find mode. You
never put
! Smith
in the last name field. Instead, you just put
!
all by itself. See the box on
Finding Special Characters
for more on finding duplicate records.
Less than (<), Less than or Equal (≤), Greater than (>), and Greater than
or Equal (≥)
These operators tell FileMaker to use your criteria as a maximum or minimum rather than a
direct match. For example, the criteria
<David
finds every person whose name comes before
David alphabetically.
≤David
is just about the same, but it includes anyone named David as
well.
