by Matt Petrowsky
So what exactly is FileMaker doing on the Web? Well, the two sort of go hand in hand. The purpose of the Web and all the other stuff on the Internet is to exchange information. We know what FileMaker does - it stores and organizes information. So naturally people will want access to it.
Achieving access is somewhat complicated for most new, and even some intermediate users. The process includes making FileMaker “talk” with the Web server in use through something called a CGI. A CGI (Common Gateway Interface) is what other programs use to work with the Web server. In the case of FileMaker, the CGI is merely an AppleScript Applet. The Web server then contacts and “talks” to FileMaker when someone accessing a Web page makes a request or submission to the database.
We will go into more depth about using this AppleScript CGI in a later article. For now our objective is to give you an overview of what happens and what is out there right now. Unfortunately, few FileMaker databases are advertised on the Web. The best places to find information about FileMaker databases on the Web are through the following URLs (Uniform Resource Locator) <http://macsolutions.interstate.net/fmprocgi.html> and <http://rowen.astro.washington.edu/>. These two sites have different information and pointers to other sites that actually use FileMaker Pro for their information servers.
One of the best sites that was using FileMaker is a site by Scott Yoshinga. It is called the Internet Island <http://hisurf.aloha.com/Main.html>. In this site you will find a server that provides Hawaiian names, a Contest of the Month and something interesting called Get Lei'd. All three, to my knowledge, use FileMaker to serve their information. When I first accessed the site my expectations were low, knowing that FileMaker suffers just a little in terms of speed because of the time AppleScript takes. However, I was pleasantly surprised when using the Hawaiian name translation database. Accessing the site at 4:00 p.m. Central Time and asking it to give the names translated from Matt it popped up with the results in under 10 seconds. It gave me Makaio and Matty as my native Hawaiian names.
Another server using the FileMaker databases was the Saint Joseph County Public Library <http://sjcpl.lib.in.us/> There were serving up a Community Connection, South Bend Tribune Index and the Indiana General Assembly Database. Accessing the Tribune Index and sending a request of the word “crime” in all headlines the search returned a result of 500 records and this too happened in under 10 seconds. Quite impressive.
Also, one other site among the list of about 5 that we could find was the Webber Enterprises site. This site was primarily using FileMaker as a data acquisition tool - very powerful in terms of marketing information. The amount of information that they were requesting from site visitors was extensive and could prove quite valuable.
I did notice, however, a disclaimer that gave me some insight into the lack of speed that FileMaker and the AppleScript CGI have. There was mention that the users should allow 1-3 minutes for the form to be processed. This results from a combination of factors, all of which we will cover in an upcoming article about the FileMaker CGI.
The following are all of the sites we used to research for this article.
* Scott Yoshinaga's
Internet Island <http://hisurf.aloha.com/Main.html> is serving several databases,
including:
Find your Name in Hawaiian <http://hisurf.aloha.com/find.html>,
Contest of the Month <http://hisurf.aloha.com/contest.html> &
Get Lei'd. <http://hisurf.aloha.com/leid.html>
* The Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities <http://gonzo.hd.uib.no/> is serving a database of
runic inscriptions <http://gonzo.hd.uib.no/NCCH-docs/Runes.html>.
* The Saint Joseph County Public Library <http://sjcpl.lib.in.us/>
is serving several databases, including the
Community Connection <http://sjcpl.lib.in.us/Databases/CommConnectFindLinks.html>,
South Bend Tribune Index <http://sjcpl.lib.in.us/Databases/TribIndexFindLinks.html>, and
Indiana General Assembly Database <http://sjcpl.lib.in.us/Databases/INGovFindLinks.html>
(which includes pictures!)
* VersaCom<http://www.versa.com/> is serving several databases from the
VersaCom Technical Expertise page <http://www.versa.com/versacom/vtech.html>, see "Using FileMaker Pro with the Web"
* Webber Enterprises <http://macsolutions.interstate.net> is serving three databases:
free help <http://macsolutions.interstate.net/freehelpform.html>,
comments <http://macsolutions.interstate.net/comments.html> and
Interstate Networking Corp. customer help
<http://macsolutions.interstate.net/interstatehelp.html>