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We almost never read forewords or introductions, so we’ll try to be as brief as
possible. There were several reasons for writing this book. As time has gone by
and FileMaker has evolved into a more sophisticated development tool, the
need for more advanced FileMaker reference materials has grown as well. We
felt that while advanced FileMaker users could find some things in existing
materials, there weren’t any books available that were dedicated to this area.
Also, FileMaker has a base of more than 7 million users. Much of the FileMaker
development community is home grown and/or self taught. This is a great
testament to the utility of FileMaker the product, but it has meant that large
numbers of developers are going about their work without a good grasp of relational
design principles.
This book is the first in what will be a series of FileMaker books. It covers
areas of knowledge required for building more complex FileMaker systems;
topics such as relational theory, data modeling, security implementations, audit
trails, recursive relationships, advanced portal tricks, and advanced scripting
control techniques are discussed in depth.
The second book in the series, Advanced FileMaker Pro Web Development
(1-55622-860-0), will cover all aspects of web publishing with FileMaker Pro,
including sections on FDML, Lasso development, PHP, implementing a RAIC,
JavaScript, XML, and conducting secure web transactions with SSL. The third
book, Advanced FileMaker Pro Integrated Applications (1-55622-861-9) will
cover a variety of methods for integrating FileMaker with other technologies,
including ODBC, ActiveX, Visual Basic, AppleScript, Microsoft Terminal
Server, and Adobe Acrobat. |
