With a fresh new interface, FileMaker Pro 10 delivers the most dramatic design changes in over a decade. The redesigned and customizable Status Toolbar — similar to browser toolbars — puts commonly used FileMaker Pro features, previously only accessible from the main menu, right at users’ fingertips for streamlined navigation, better workflow and time-saving shortcuts.
Other major new features, such as the ability to save the results of a search, and Script Triggers, which launch scripts triggered by user actions or based on time limits, make using databases easier than ever before.
Also shipping today is the entire FileMaker Pro 10 product line, which includes FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced, FileMaker Server 10 and FileMaker Server 10 Advanced.
“The new FileMaker Pro 10 interface is the result of years of in-depth research into how people actually interact with databases,” said FileMaker president Dominique Goupil, in the press release. “The result is a major new version of FileMaker Pro that brings the power of databases to everyone whether they create their own databases, or use one from someone else. Also, the new customization and scripting features in version 10 will save both end users and developers time and money.”
FileMaker Pro 10 now saves searches automatically and allows you to name and save a set of specific searches. For example, if you want to create a find request for customers in California who have spent more than $1,000 in the past year, but have not ordered in the last three months, FileMaker Pro will save the search so you can access it over and over again in the future. The new Saved Finds feature makes searching a “no-brainer.”
FileMaker Pro 10 also introduces Script Triggers, allowing both users and developers major new options for automating tasks and boosting productivity. Now you can specify that a FileMaker Script (similar to a spreadsheet macro) will run based on timing or whenever users take a specified action in Browse Mode or Find Mode, such as clicking in a field or exiting a viewing mode. FileMaker Pro comes with 12 ready-to-use Script Triggers (five object-based and seven layout-based).
One of the most popular uses of databases is to create reports. With FileMaker Pro 10, you can now create beautiful reports — simple or sophisticated — that are based on your data. And, unique only to FileMaker Pro 10, you can actually make changes directly to the underlying data from within your report “on-the-fly” as you work. Any changes you may make to the data within your report will also show up immediately in the database, without ever having to switch views!
Other new FileMaker Pro 10 features include:
• Enhanced Quick Start Screen — Get going quickly with the new “See it, Use it, Learn it” interface to start learning how to use FileMaker Pro. Plus easily create databases from existing data sources like .CSV, Tab, and also now from Excel 2007 (.xlsx) or Bento 2.
• Enhanced SQL support — Now you can display, access and use data from even more SQL sources, including SQL tables in Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Oracle 11g and MySQL 5.1 community edition.
• Send Mail via SMTP — Save time by sending email directly from FileMaker Pro instead of having to open your email client.
New FileMaker Server 10 Products
FileMaker Server 10 has several new features, including: simplified server management that allows administrators to import and export records using server-based scripts — no more robots are required; an enhanced PHP Site Assistant with 10 PHP Site Assistant themes plus one for the iPhone — to create visually stunning websites in minutes; the ability to send mail via SMTP directly from FileMaker Server 10 without the need for an e-mail client; and a new Database Log Viewer that provides a snapshot of your database logs to quickly pinpoint trouble spots. FileMaker Server 10 Advanced now allows up to 999 users to simultaneously connect to FileMaker Pro databases — about four times the number of live connections in FileMaker Server 10 and in previous versions of FileMaker Server Advanced.
All FileMaker 10 products are immediately available. New users may order FileMaker Pro 10 for $299 /$179 upgrade (U.S. suggested list price) and FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced for $499/$299 upgrade (U.S. suggested list price). FileMaker Server 10 is $999/$599 upgrade (U.S. suggested list price) and FileMaker Server 10 Advanced is $2,999/$1,799 upgrade (U.S. suggested list price). Additional pricing and upgrade information is available at http://www.filemaker.com.
FileMaker Pro 10 and Bento at MacWorld Expo
Attendees at MacWorld Expo will see FileMaker Pro 10 and Bento 2, the personal database for Mac, at the FileMaker booth (#1225). The FileMaker Pavilion, booth #1125, will feature solutions and tools from independent FileMaker developers.
FileMaker, Inc. develops award-winning database software. Its products include the legendary FileMaker Pro product line for Windows, Mac and the Web, and the Bento personal database for Mac. FileMaker Pro won 49 awards, more than its next eight competitors combined, from 2003-2008 in the U.S., and a total of 130 awards worldwide during this time. Millions of customers, from individuals to large organizations, rely on FileMaker, Inc. software to manage, analyze and share information. FileMaker, Inc. is a subsidiary of Apple Inc.
Source: FileMaker, Inc.
What, no iPhone templates (outside of Server) or iPhone app to go along with this? Does anyone know if this is written in Cocoa yet and will it take advantage of multiple processors/more RAM? Is it ready to take advantage of Snow Leopard when it is released?
Inquiring minds want to know…
No Cocoa…
Same old UI widgets… so we get that warm fuzzy nostalgic feel using MacPaint graphic pickers and I love the old time feel of dialog selection for graphic elements that are laboriously created in other graphic apps—I’ll have none of that drag n drop badness thanks you!
Alpha channel, gradients… err this is a database app no one is supposed to see your data right!
How are you supposed to show off your longevity when you don’t show your 80’s roots… every where.
Toolbar to replace the vertical bar…
yep FM has moved in to the Borland 90s
I agree!!! Don’t spend a year and a 1/2 moving things around the layout and call it an Full upgrade. Call it 9.1.
Hoping for mail and calendar integration like Bento. Better intergration with iWork, iPhone Developer tools, Dreamweaver integration and the Features SirROM mentioned.
To name a few.
I’m sure there will be a torrent of users who are unwilling to pay full price for ”another“ meager upgrade…
Just sayin
There have been some under the hood improvements… but the dev tools suck. We need a real IDE that brings modern tools… working with Xcode then going to FM shows how real the pain is.
I know windows users need a good client, but give the developers a real Xcode like experience on the mothership’s platform.
BTW reporting improvements are worth the price of admission IMHO. Just…
can someone please explain why bento isn’t part of iwork? that would make an even more appealling office alternative, still lowkey enough for big corporations not to challenge microsoft but even more compelling for home and small-business-user.
and then all 4 on their way in the cloud to silently open them up for the masses of pc-users thus making mobile me more appealing thus creating an ongoing subscription-stream of billions. sounds like a plan.
This one is BIG news:
“FileMaker Server 10 Advanced now allows up to 999 users to simultaneously connect to FileMaker Pro databases — about four times the number of live connections in FileMaker Server 10 and in previous versions of FileMaker Server Advanced.”
Limited scalability has been Filemaker’s Achilles heel for some time now. The jump from 250 to 1000 simultaneous “calls” makes Filemaker a viable option for a lot more companies/projects.
I have long thought that FileMaker was one of the most “pure” expressions of a Mac application. I first bought it from the booth at the 1985 MacWorld and have owned/used many of the revs since then.
Consequently, I am not sure the new look with the “Status Bar” across the top is something that excites me or is even a good idea. I don’t know about others, but I have more screen real estate left and right than I do up and down; it is more convenient for me to see tools and such on the left than at the top. Oh, well, I don’t suppose it has a “classic” mode, eh?
Also, I am stunned that it is still in Carbon – it is ridiculous that any Apple app, on the eve of the introduction of Snow Leopard, has not been moved to Cocoa/XCode.
I guess I’ll continue using the old version for a while…
On one hand I sense that FileMaker is held back by the need to be a multi-platform database. Hence, it can’t have the Mac look-and-feel because it must also operate on Windows.
However, Apple makes software like iTunes and Safari that work on both platforms and still maintain the Mac look-and-feel.
So what the hell is up with the folks at FileMaker? Why don’t they use more of OS X’s UI rather than creating an unusual interface that is not Mac and not XP and not Vista.
And BTW, still no integration with iCal and the Address Book. WTF?
After dealing with FileMaker this morning, I gotta warn ya. Don’t buy this software.
This company has become a bureaucratic nightmare. The bureaucracy is conveyed in the company and how it services companies, as well as the software.
After spending thousands on FileMaker server, I found out you can’t even store your databases on an external drive!!!!
That’s just dumb. The list of dumb things about FileMaker, Inc. grows exponentially every year.
@ Ralph M:
I agree with your comments about screen real estate. Since the toolbar has always been on the left-hand side (for like 15 years or more!) most solutions have been designed with controls along the top, including FileMakers own. If the toolbar controls are now along the top, that will make most solutions about an inch too high for the screens they were designed for. At minimum, this should have been an *option* for the new UI, not dogma.
@ 84 Mac Guy:
The product is cross-platform, but Windows has a dozen other databases that all sell rather more than FileMaker for Windows. The core product is the Mac version, and like Adobe, they have been thumbing their noses at Mac users for years now because they are using some kind of cross-platform bullshit development process.
@ Thelonius Mac:
The bureaucracy started for me when they moved to “product activation” (a la windows). This stops even licensed, paying users of the software from using it if you are using the “wrong” computer. I once had an entire department not be able to access the FM server, simply because I was at home, and my home computer was not currently on their list of allowed computers for my advanced client.
Absolute bullsh*t service from FileMaker.
It may not be as full-featured, but ever since using Bento, I will never create another database in FileMaker again. I know Bento lacks scripting, but it does some things so easily that it would take hours laying out in FileMaker.
I would rather fit my solutions within Bento’s limitations and be able to create many useful databases quickly, that look like what an OS X Cocoa iLife like database should look like, not something created in Mac OS 8.5.