I've tried to find the answer to this myself but haven't had any luck,
so once again I turn to the group. Basically the database I have
created is a task manager. When the employee finishes their task they
save out a file. I need to be able to place a reference to this file
(i.e. the file path) into the database.

What I would like to be able to do is have a text field called
"filePath" with a Browse button next to it. The user clicks the
button, navigates to their file, chooses it, and the path to that file
is saved in the database. I don't need an actual link to the file or
anything, just the path to the file converted to text and placed in the
field.

Any suggestions on how to go about this? Thanks in advance!


--
"Giving money and power to government is like
giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."
-- P. J. O'Rourke

Milt,

You don't say what kind of file they save out, or what means you use to do
that.

If it is, for example, "Export field contents..." under user control, you
won't automatically be able to learn what name they gave the file. There is
no Get(LastUserExportFileName) function.

You could save the file under predetermined means, for example by
Get(DocumentsPath) to determine the user's documents directory, then
appending your file name. Once you build the file name for export, you could
of course save that path in any field.

A problem with the second method is that a user can always delete or move
whatever file they've exported, so the saved path in your database file
would be not very useful. You might want to consider:

1) building the output path name
2) exporting the file to this predetermined location
3) importing the file into a FileMaker field
4) [optionally] storing the path of the original export.

---
"Giving FileMaker tips to newbies is like
giving automatic weapons to infants."
-Bill Marriott


"This Being Milt" <thisbeingmilt (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote

Hi Bill, thanks for your help. The file they save out is a proprietary
file using some software we have developed in-house. The files are
stored on our server. What I want to do is to be able to store in the
database the path to this file from the root level of the server. This
way when someone says "Hey, where's that file?" I have a reference link.

Right now I've been manually entering these paths by copying the path
from a terminal window. I have a little button next to the filePath
field that copies its contents into the clipboard. This way a few
days from now when someone emails me and asks me where a particular
file is I simply go to the appropriate record, click the button, and I
can paste the complete file path into an email.

All I really need to do is to be able to browse to a file (or to a
folder) and have the path returned as a text value.

/server/directory/directory/directory/filename.xxx

Is this possible?

On 2005-12-07 14:31:23 -0800, "Bill Marriott" <wjm (AT) wjm (DOT) org> said:


--
"Giving money and power to government is like
giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."
-- P. J. O'Rourke

Yes.

1) Create a container field, "c"
2) Create a script with the step:

Insert File[Reference; YourTable::c]

3) Create a field, "MyFilePath" (calculation, text result) =

Let ( [
FullURL = RightValues ( c; 1) ;
OSPrefix="filewin:";
dDelimA = "/";
dDelimB = "\\"
];

Substitute(Right(FullURL;Length(FullURL) - Length(OSPrefix));
dDelimA ; dDelimB )

)

Now, when you run this script step, the user will be prompted to locate a
file. They navigate to the file on your server. After they select the file
and click "open," a reference is stored in container field c.

The reference looks like this, internal to "c":

file:MyServerFile.xyz
filewin://Server/Volume/Directory/MyServerFile.xyz

(FileMaker shows the document icon, or image, or media file in Browse mode,
but has the text version of it stored as well, accessible to formulas. The
full path is only available when the file is stores as a "reference.")

The calculation in MyFilePath just strips out the beginning "filewin:"
business and converts the "/" to "\" so it's appropriate for pasting into
the address bar of any Windows Explorer or IE window. You'll want to adjust
that formula if you are not running in an all-Windows environment. The
result of the MyFilePath is:

\\Server\Volume\Directory\MyServerFile.xyz

Bill


"This Being Milt" <thisbeingmilt (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote

Hi Bill. When I recreate your calculation below I get an error where
the FullURL in the substitute function is highlighted and FMP tells me
that the field cannnot be found.

On 2005-12-07 16:11:58 -0800, "Bill Marriott" <wjm (AT) wjm (DOT) org> said:


--
"Giving money and power to government is like
giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."
-- P. J. O'Rourke

You are using FM7 or FM8 right? You probably have a typo in there.

1) Copy and paste everything in my original message from the "Let" to the
ending ")" (alone by itself). I just did the same to double-check, and it
works.

- Don't add a semicolon to the end of the line starting with dDelimB
- The brackets "[" and "]" are required
- Did you think I made a mistake by using "\\" instead of "\"? I didn't. the
"\\" is required because within a string, \ is an "escape" character that
enables you to include a quote inside a quote. So inside calcs, \" means "
and \\ means \.

2) If, for some reason, your newsgroup server/newsgroup reader is mangling
the readable version, here is a more compact form. Use everything between
the blank lines:



Let([FullURL=RightValues(c;1);OSPrefix="filewin:";
dDelimA="/";dDelimB="\\"];
Substitute(Right(FullURL;Length(FullURL)-
Length(OSPrefix));dDelimA;dDelimB))



The Let() function is a little weird to understand at first, but here is
what it does:

You could easily say in a formula:

2 + 7 + 13

to get a result of 22. Alternately you could say, in "English"

a = 2
b = 7
c = 13

a + b + c

The Let() function enables you to use variable names (within the current
calculation) like this without creating separate fields for them.

Let ([
a = 2;
b = 7;
c = 13
];
a + b + c
)

It just requires some extra "punctuation," specifically:

- "Let(" to mark the beginning of the function
- "[" to mark the beginning of the variables list
- ";" to indicate the end of a variable/value pair (except the last pair!)
- "];" to mark the end of the variable declarations, and the beginning of
the calculation that uses them
- ")" to mark the very end of the Let function

You probably wouldn't use Let() when you are using simple values like 2, 7,
and 12. But when a component of your calculation is long and complicated and
you have to use that component more than once, Let() dramatically assists in
readability and processing speed.

In this case, I used Let() so that you could see more clearly how I am
slicing up the values stored in "c" and also so that you could modify this
to handle cross-platform stuff later on. Without using Let() the function
looks like:

Substitute(Right(RightValues(c;1);Length(RightValu es(c;1))-
Length("filewin:"));"/";"\\")

Good luck.

Bill

"This Being Milt" <thisbeingmilt (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote

Ah, I see what happened. There was an errant character in the text
which wasn't showing up in FMP but was visible when I pasted it into a
text editor.

Apart from this the script worked perfectly. Once again, Bill, thank
you very much!

Lee



On 2005-12-07 23:33:54 -0800, "Bill Marriott" <wjm (AT) wjm (DOT) org> said:


--
"Giving money and power to government is like
giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys."
-- P. J. O'Rourke