Using Snapshot Links for Found Sets

Developing in FileMaker Pro is rewarding because of the speed with which you can accomplish things. The speed, however, isn’t worth much when you only know one possible way to do things. It’s the master carpenter, who knows all the tools and methods for getting things done, who is the most efficient.

When it comes to replicating a found set within FileMaker, there are many paths to take. Your standard Perform Find script step will simply pull up a found set of records based on predefined or dynamic criteria.

There are, however, many cases where a found set is composed of data which has been filtered. This could be a list view of data where individual records have been omitted or a set of related records derived from a filtered portal.

Regardless of how the found set is derived, if it’s a random set of records which need to be recalled, then saving this found set becomes valuable. It turns out, there’s a method for saving this found set and it’s the most optimized method possible. This is because it’s the same method which FileMaker itself uses.

This video is about recreating a found set and being able to use it in various ways. It could be used for a PSOS (server side) script or simply to provide the user with a feature of being able to save and recall a found set of records at any time. No matter what your needs, knowing how to use this feature is a valuable piece of FileMaker know-how!

AttachmentSize
SnapshotLinkFoundSets.zip293.9 KB

Comments

Thank you Matt for this great video.

I wonder how much performance impact would be to have snapshot links saved to emulate web browsers back and forward buttons in a FM database solution.

Snapshot links would have to be saved on "OnLayoutExit" script triggers for each layout. The text files names (for instance, timestamps), could be stored on a global variable as list items so they could be retrieved when the user clicked on "back" or "forward" buttons. Would this make sense?

Great video and great functionality. Any way to restore the sort order as well? Thanks.