Overview of FileMaker Products

The FileMaker product line is composed of a number of distinct pieces. Understanding their different strengths, capabilities, and requirements is an important part of your FileMaker knowledge base. In this chapter we give a quick overview of the purpose and profile of each piece of the FileMaker software suite, along with relevant operating system requirements.

FileMaker Pro 8

FileMaker Pro is the original, all-in-one database design, development, deployment, and access tool. Users of FileMaker Pro have access to a full suite of database design tools and can create their own databases from scratch, with full authoring privileges. FileMaker Pro can host databases, sharing them across very small groups of users, via FileMaker network sharing or Instant Web Publishing (IWP). A copy of FileMaker Pro is required in order to open and use FileMaker databases created by others, unless you're using IWP.

If you are an advanced developer or working to build a complex system, we recommend FileMaker Pro Advanced. If you wish to share your databases with more than a few FileMaker users at a time, you'll need FileMaker Server. If you need to share your databases with similar numbers of users via the Web or ODBC/JDBC, you'll need FileMaker Server Advanced.

Operating system requirements are as follows:

Mac: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or greater

Windows: Windows 2000 (Service Pack 4), Windows XP (Service Pack 2)

FileMaker Pro 8 Advanced

FileMaker Pro Advanced is the successor to FileMaker Developer. FileMaker Pro Advanced includes all of the features and functionality present in the regular FileMaker Pro software, but has a series of additional features aimed at application developers. These include tools for debugging scripts; the capability to design custom functions, custom menus, and tooltips; the capability to perform file maintenance; a Database Design Report that can help document a system; and a set of tools that let you create a variety of "runtime" executable solutions. Pro 8 Advanced also includes many new features that speed development, such as the capability to copy and paste fields, tables and script steps.

We strongly recommend FileMaker Pro Advanced for any FileMaker developer who is serious about designing high-quality database systems. The extra tools are well worth the additional cost and, by using Advanced, developers can extend the functionality of their systems to end users by utilizing tool tips and custom menus.

Operating system requirements are as follows:

Mac: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or greater

Windows: Windows 2000 (Service Pack 4), Windows XP (Service Pack 2)

FileMaker Server 8

FileMaker Server is the tool of choice for sharing FileMaker files with more than a handful of concurrent FileMaker users. Whereas the peer-to-peer file hosting available in FileMaker Pro and Pro Advanced can host no more than 10 files for no more than 5 users, FileMaker Server can host as many as 125 files for as many as 250 concurrent FileMaker users. FileMaker Server can also perform regular, automated backups of database files, handle automatic distribution of plug-ins to FileMaker clients, and log various usage statistics.

If you want to share your databases with more than a few users, you'll want to invest in FileMaker Server.

Operating system requirements are as follows:

Mac: Mac OS X or Mac OS X Server 10.3.9 or greater

Windows: Windows 2000 Server (Service Pack 4), Windows XP (Service Pack 2), Windows 2003 Server Standard Edition (Service Pack 1)

FileMaker Server 8 Advanced

FileMaker Server Advanced is required in order to host databases via Instant Web Publishing (IWP) or ODBC/JDBC to more than a few clients at once. It's also necessary in order to take advantage of FileMaker's XML-based Custom Web Publishing (CWP). FileMaker Pro and Pro Advanced can perform hosting for IWP or ODBC/JDBC for a small number of clients, but CWP is available only via Server Advanced. Server Advanced can host up to 250 combined FileMaker and ODBC/JDBC connections, and up to 100 IWP connections. The number of CWP connections is generally limited only by the underlying server operating system and hardware and web server capabilities.

Operating system requirements are as follows:

Mac: Mac OS X or Mac OS X Server 10.3.9 or greater; Apache 1.3 Web Server

Windows: Windows 2000 Server (Service Pack 4), Windows XP (Service Pack 2), Windows 2003 Server Standard Edition (Service Pack 1); Internet Information Server (IIS) 5.0 on Windows 200 Server, or IIS 6.0 on Windows Server 2003

FileMaker Mobile 8

FileMaker Mobile is software that enables you to download FileMaker databases (or subsets thereof) to a PocketPC or PalmOS device. Databases downloaded to a handheld may be used in an "offline" fashion and later synchronized with the master database via the handheld device's synchronization software, in combination with FileMaker Mobile.

Up to 50 tables may be installed on a single handheld device. There are limitations on the size of downloaded data sets: Field length limitations are stricter than in the regular FileMaker Pro client, and only 50 fields per table can be shared with the handheld device.

Previous versions of FileMaker Mobile could only synchronize with local (non-hosted) FileMaker databases. FileMaker Mobile 8 adds the very significant capability of synchronizing a handheld database with a FileMaker database hosted elsewhere than on the FileMaker Mobile computer (for example, by FileMaker Server, or by another FileMaker Pro client hosting the files in peer-to-peer mode).

Operating system requirements are as follows:

Mac: Mac OS X 10.3.9 or greater; Palm Desktop 4.2 with Hotsync Manager for PalmOS devices

Windows: Windows 2000 (Service Pack 4), Windows XP (Service Pack 2); Palm Desktop 4.1 with Hotsync Manager for PalmOS devices; ActiveSync 3.8 for PocketPC devices