The Metadata-verse: FileMaker Server Save as XML

by Vincenzo Menanno
Posted in All, Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, InspectorPro, Integration, Performance, Tools & Add-ons

As Claris gets further into an Agile groove, there are product releases more often, always with new features and improvements. Claris FileMaker 19.5 is no exception. It includes many new features, expanded extensibility, performance enhancements, and reliability improvements. I want to bring attention to one simple thing that promises to change the world for many of us in the FileMaker developer community: Save a Copy as XML…and the performance improvements running this on FileMaker Server.

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dotfmp.berlin Claris FileMaker Developers 2022

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Claris Development, Community, Events, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Cloud, FileMaker Server, News, Techniques, Tools & Add-ons

BERLIN, Germany – Our senior developer Christos Savva attended the dotfmp.berlin 2022 “Unconference” held in June in Berlin. The conference was the first in-person opportunity in over two years for leading Claris FileMaker developers across Europe to meet, share their work, and explore what’s happening in the developer community.

At dotfmp.berlin 2022, more than 70 developers from eighteen countries talked through tools and techniques from their Claris playgrounds. Adding to that excitement was participation by Claris’s engineering and product management teams.

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bBox v0.99 Integrates Claris FileMaker with JavaScript, Python 3 and Supports M1 Apple Silicon

by Simon Brown
Posted in All, bBox, Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Server, Integration, JavaScript, Node.js, Python, Tools & Add-ons

We are pleased to release bBox version 0.99 for Claris® FileMaker® on macOS and Linux with new NodeJS and Python 3 integration, and M1 Apple silicon support for GraphicsMagick image processing and JQ JSON parsing functions.

About bBox Plug-in For FileMaker

bBox is a free utility plug-in to extend Claris FileMaker solutions to easily use macOS and Linux code libraries and functions from Python, JavaScript, PHP, Ruby, AppleScript, C/C++, Bash/sh, XPath, and SQLite. Also included is a demo file with more than 210 examples of how you can put bBox functions to work for you.

bBox is available on macOS and Linux, and runs with either FileMaker Pro or FileMaker Server. Here’s what FileMaker Magazine had to say about bBox version 0.99:

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Tableau Conference 2022 – Day 3

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Community, Data Analytics, Events, Python, Reporting, Tableau

We finished three days of Tableau Conference 2022 (TC22) in sunny Las Vegas! The in-person and virtual attendees from Beezwax’s Data Analytics & Tableau development teams shared a few more highlights of TC22 sessions, with information, insights and a few key takeaways.
Continue reading “Tableau Conference 2022 – Day 3” →

Tableau Conference 2022 – Day 2

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Community, Data Analytics, Events, Python, Reporting, Tableau

Hello again from the end of Day 2 at Tableau Conference 2022 (TC22) in sunny Las Vegas! The in-person and virtual attendees from Beezwax’s Data Analytics & Tableau development teams shared more highlights of TC22 sessions, with information, insights and a few key takeaways.
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Tableau Conference 2022 – Highlights

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Community, Data Analytics, Events, Python, Reporting, Tableau

Hello from Tableau Conference 2022 (TC22) in sunny Las Vegas! Attending in-person from Beezwax were Rob, Sarah, Vince and Jay from our Tableau/Analytics team, with several more Beez joining virtually.
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Custom Functions For Today’s FileMaker Devs Of Tomorrow

by Beezwax Team
Posted in FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Go, Software Design, Techniques, Uncategorized

While working from home, and continuing to hone one’s FileMaker skills, it’s important for developers to stay active with ongoing learning pursuits. Claris® FileMaker®, as the world’s leading Workplace Innovation Platform, supports both the rapid creation of new custom apps, as well as the practical application of solutions to solve real-world business problems. Here, creative ideation is critical.

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Claris Connect integrates Eversign [Xodo Sign], FileMaker and more

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Claris Connect, Claris Development, Events, FileMaker, FileMaker 18, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Cloud, FileMaker Server, Integration, Techniques, Tools & Add-ons

Let’s talk about Claris Connect as the way to orchestrate data-driven workflows involving Xodo Sign (formerly Eversign*) digital signatures, Claris FileMaker, Slack and a range of other possible platforms! Fabio Bosisio from Beezwax will walk through details for setting up these types of integrations.

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The Benefits of Automated Testing

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, JavaScript, Ruby, Ruby on Rails, Software Design, Testing

Software changes over time. Your company’s web site this year does things you had no idea you needed two years ago. How can we keep the cost of change manageable?

Automated testing is one way. Especially for large software projects, the practice of automated testing can dramatically reduce the cost of adapting software to new business necessities.

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The Human Resource – Beezwax Anniversary Edition

by Julian Nadel
Posted in All, Beezwax News, Business, Community, Management, Organization Development

26 years in, a founding Bee reflects.

Julian Nadel is president and founder of Beezwax. He’s celebrating the 26th Anniversary of Beezwax with this update to his original Beezwax Blog post.

In 2014, a colleague interviewed me about Beezwax; the interview transcript was the orginal basis for the article herein. It was then and still is now one of the only public summaries of my thoughts on how Beezwax works, and why.

Since being published, the article has been a meaningful springboard for many conversations I’ve had… with existing Beez, clients, and colleagues… and people new to Beezwax. As we reach another milestone – completing our 26th year – I’m taking this opportunity to revisit the article and provide an update.

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Beezwax Wins Claris Excellence Award

by Jay Gonzales
Posted in All, Beezwax News, Claris Connect, Claris Development, Community, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Cloud, News

Beezwax Recognized for Advocacy Excellence, Sharing Expertise and Passion with Customers and Developers In the Claris Community

CUPERTINO, Calif. – Dec. 15, 2021 – Claris International Inc., an Apple company, named Beezwax Datatools Inc. as winner of the Advocacy Excellence Award as part of the Claris Excellence Awards for 2021, which honor Claris Partners and Claris Community members who have made outstanding contributions and accomplishments around the globe in 2021.

Partners and community members are selected for their award-worthy achievements using the Claris platform. The Advocacy Excellence Award recognizes a Claris partner for sharing expertise and passion while increasing awareness of Claris products and expanding the Claris Community of users and developers.

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OOP Fundamentals: Quick and Dirty Guide to Testing

by Federico Ramirez
Posted in All, JavaScript, Python, Ruby, Ruby on Rails, Software Design, Swift, Testing, Web Development

There are entire books written on testing. And it surely feels more an art than a science. My approach is similar to Kent Beck’s:

I get paid for code that works, not for tests, so my philosophy is to test as little as possible to reach a given level of confidence (I suspect this level of confidence is high compared to industry standards, but that could just be hubris). If I don’t typically make a kind of mistake (like setting the wrong variables in a constructor), I don’t test for it. I do tend to make sense of test errors, so I’m extra careful when I have logic with complicated conditionals. When coding on a team, I modify my strategy to carefully test code that we, collectively, tend to get wrong.

https://stackoverflow.com/a/153565/1015566

He goes on to add that different people will have different strategies and, at the end of the day, you just have to do what works best for you and your team. Extremely practical, and the approach I personally follow.

This won’t be a detailed post on every possible topic on tests and testing in Object-oriented Programming (OOP). There are many books about that already. Instead, this article will cover the basics of testing, so you understand how and why we test, and you can adapt it to your own needs.

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A fast, flexible Tableau Connector for FileMaker

by Vincenzo Menanno
Posted in All, Claris Development, Data Analytics, FileMaker, FileMaker 18, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Data API, FileMaker Server, Integration, Performance, Tableau, Tableau FM, Techniques, Tools & Add-ons

Building a custom Tableau® Connector for Claris® FileMaker® enables faster, more reliable and more flexible connections between Tableau and FileMaker datasources, compared with the legacy Web Data Connector.

For a number of Beezwax client projects, we’ve installed and deployed a Tableau Connector (aka “TACO”) for FileMaker. The TACO was built using the Tableau Connector SDK (provided by Tableau) to connect to datasources on FileMaker Server. The TACO method uses JDBC rather than the FileMaker Data API for the connection between FileMaker and Tableau, and in our testing the performance of data extracts was up to 10 times faster.

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The Value and Benefits of Transactions with Claris FileMaker

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Claris Development, Events, FileMaker, FileMaker 18, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Server, Performance, Techniques

Let’s talk about Claris® FileMaker® and transactions! Vincenzo Menanno discusses what transactions are, how they relate to FileMaker data operations (creating, updating, and deleting records), database normalization, and how to use transactional concepts to improve FileMaker performance, especially over a wide area network (WAN).

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bBox for FileMaker v0.98 with M1, GraphicsMagick & Sips

by Simon Brown
Posted in All, bBox, Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 18, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Server, Tools & Add-ons

We are pleased to release bBox version 0.98, with with new image file functions and M1/Apple Silicon support.

bBox is a free utility plug-in to extend FileMaker solutions to easily use code libraries and macOS-based functions from Python, JavaScript, PHP, Ruby, AppleScript, C/C++, Bash/sh, XPath, and SQLite. Also included is a demo file that has over 220 examples of how you can put bBox functions to work for you.

Some of the changes in version 0.98 are:

  • M1/Apple Silicon binary
  • Ubuntu compatible version (in addition to CentOS)
  • updated to libxml2 version 2.9.12
  • added bBox_GraphicsMagick function & script step
  • added bBox_Sips function & script step
  • modifications to several functions & script steps to add parameters
  • fixed template text used in several functions & script steps to better describe parameters
  • limit POSIX commands to 3 cores
  • new mode to combine stderr with stdout

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Q Foundation – Increased Agility For Social Services

by Beezwax Team
Posted in All, Beezwax News, Business, Community, FileMaker

Beezwax helped the Q Foundation get ahead of a persistent pandemic and quickly pivot to decentralized operations to support a remote workforce.

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FileMaker Performance on Apple M1 | Astounding!

by Vincenzo Menanno
Posted in Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Server, News, Performance, Server Administration, Tableau FM, Testing

When the Apple silicon Macs with M1 chips came out, I read and watched many of the reviews. Most of them had great things to say about the promise of Apple’s new M1 chip…I was impressed. When I finally received my Apple M1 MacBook Pro, and started to use it…I was amazed.

Back in 2020, FileMaker Pro 19.2 wasn’t optimized yet for Apple silicon processors, but ran fine under Rosetta emulation. On my M1 MacBook Pro, it already felt much faster than running FileMaker “natively” on an Intel-based MacBook…I was astonished.

Today, I’m running the just-released Claris FileMaker® 19.3, with native support for Apple’s M1 chip, on a new MacBook Pro. It is, in a word: Astounding!

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InspectorPro 7.2 for FileMaker – Faster on M1!

by Vincenzo Menanno
Posted in All, Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Cloud, FileMaker Server, InspectorPro, Performance, Tools & Add-ons

Everything about the M1 Apple silicon leaves you simply delighted and surprised. It’s like the first time you drive a super-charged Tesla and feel the rush of powerful acceleration OR I imagine it’s like when Han Solo first blasts the Falcon into light speed: it must be experienced to be believed.

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OData for FileMaker – Examples, Tips and Nuances

by Steve Senft-Herrera
Posted in All, Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Cloud, FileMaker Data API, FileMaker Server, Integration, Techniques

This blog post is the second of a three-part series about the FileMaker OData API, introducing a demo file with more than 40 examples plus helpful tips, along with Q&A. Part one of the series highlighted some of the key features of the API which make it an exciting addition to the FileMaker platform. As a follow-up, this post will cover the basics and dig into the nuances of using OData with Claris FileMaker.

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Integrating FileMaker’s Data API and Ruby with the fmrest-ruby gem

by Pedro Carbajal
Posted in Claris Development, FileMaker, FileMaker 18, FileMaker 19, FileMaker Data API, Integration, Ruby, Ruby on Rails, Software Design, Tools & Add-ons, Web Development

We often work on projects that intersect two technologies near and dear to us: FileMaker and Ruby. This allows us to build robust web applications in Ruby on Rails, integrated with data sources from FileMaker solutions. When Claris introduced the FileMaker Data API we were naturally curious to try it out. At the time there was no off-the-shelf Ruby library for us to simply gem install, so we decided to roll up our sleeves and build one. Thus, fmrest-ruby was born.

This article will walk you through setting up and using fmrest-ruby in a Ruby on Rails project. Some level of familiarity with Ruby/Rails and FileMaker’s Data API is advised, although much of the content covered here is applicable to any Ruby project, Rails or not.

Continue reading “Integrating FileMaker’s Data API and Ruby with the fmrest-ruby gem” →
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