Customer Reviews
File Maker Pro Review 
2008-03-29
I didn't purchase Filemaker Pro for my own use. I purchased it on behalf of the Paradise (CA) Friends of the Library on the recommendation of the board member who had prior experience in using it. Our goal was to create a more usable mailing list. We wanted software that would be all encompasing. That is, to do everything that a non-profit osrganization needs to do to maintain contact with its members, send out membership information and renewal notices. Filemaker Pro does all this and more. We no longer need any other software for day to day operations.
Avoid 9, stay with 8.5 
2008-01-20
FileMaker 9 contains very few new features over FileMaker 8.5. One of those new features is an activation system that from my experience, is a royal hassle that will cause you to waste lots of time and energy dealing with their tech support. And what do you plan to do when your free tech support runs out?
Run, do not walk away from this product.
If you don't need FileMaker 9, stay with 8.5. And if you are using 8.5, now is the time to look for another program to switch to.
Great, Simple, Flexible, Powerful! 2007-12-12
I am not a programmer, but I am a computer nerd. By profession, I am a lawyer. Databases are a very valuable asset for lawyers. In fact, there are about a dozen companies out there who sell customized database applications for lawyers. I've tried alot of them and even use one of these proprietary databases in my practice.
I am considering eventually making my office all-Mac (stability, virus-free, machines stay current and last longer than PC) so I investigated Filemaker. Filemaker will allow me to track all my data exactly how I want and mix Macs and PC's in my office.
Filemaker Pro 9 ships with alot of "Starter Applications"--these are databases already completely set up for you. You enter or import your data and for probably 80% of people who need a database, this is a great place to start--and you may never need to do anything else. Contacts, asset management, task and project management, there are dozens of starter solutions built right into Filemaker.
For us tinkerers, we want to be able to to make the database track what we want, and in exactly the way we want. You DO NOT have to be a computer programmer to do this or learn some crazy and difficult magic language as another reviewer suggests. It is hands down easier to do this stuff in FMP9 than in any other product out there. That that other reviewer would even suggest that Filemaker Pro and any SQL solution is even in the same ballpark in difficulty is ridiculous. SQL gives professional, full-time programmers nightmares. If you can figure out the train wreck that is SQL queries, you'll feel like you landed in a sunny tropical paradise in FMP9. Understand, this is not a crippled, limited tool. Its a full featured, powerful relational database with tools built into it to make it as easy for new users as possible to use. You can make about as complex a database with powerful automated features as you could ever want. BUT, if you do that, you DO have to LEARN how to do it. Complex databases take some planning and know how. Read a book or watch a training video, and tinker.
If you learn how to use FMP9, I can tell you that you will save on other software costs in the future, because you can throw together whatever you need--no buying multiple other apps to track this or that.
I'd suggest the very readable Filemaker Pro The Missing Manual as a great book. There are videos you can watch on your computer, too. You can pick up Filemaker 8 training for $10 on ebay, and that will teach you 90% of what you need to know bc the basics did not change much between 8 and 9. I also got s cheap copy of Chris Ippolite's "Beyond the Basics" training DVD and it is truly excellent.
If you are the type who might consider customizing a database, then Filemaker is hands down the best option out there. Give it a try--you can download a 30 day evaluation copy at the Filemaker web site. I think you'll be impressed.
Screen repaints unacceptably slow with Windows XP 
2007-10-18
Filemaker Pro 9 had all the appearance of a great update; but I found it was all appearance and little performance. You would think that my application was running over a slow dial up telephone line rather than just locally on my PC. I am using Windows XP and Filemaker is incredibly slow in repainting the screen as you move from tab to tab on a form using a tab control. When forms are displayed you can literally see the objects being individually populated on the screen. I thought maybe it was my lack of experience in programming that lead to the poor performance, so I forked out for professional templates from seedcode.com and scriptology.com, both highly regarded Filemaker partners. It didn't make any difference. In fact these professionally developed applications do all sorts of seemingly random screen repaints (including on average 4 full screen repaints) before the display calms down. Sort of reminds me of TV circa late 1950 for those of you old enough to remember. There is so much to like about Filemaker; some web postings suggest that you should just accept screen flicker. Why should I; neither MS Access 2007 or Alpha Five have this problem.
Inviting Trouble 2007-10-15
Been trying to learn Filemaker only for 1 reason. It is touted as the "Mac Friendly Database".
And I badly needed a cute and cuddly database for my Power Mac at home for use with iWork and MS Office. Hearing the words "Mac friendly" made me jump into the bandwagon and here I am writing a review so that the my mistake is not repeated by some one else.Read the words carefully though - Its technology is Mac friendly, but the database itself is not very User friendly. They cant tell that to users though... can they?
Many reviews mentioned it easier to learn and implement than XAMP (OSX-Apache-MySQL-PHP) or atleast thats what I thought. So I gave 1 star for its cool looks and Mac support. Awesome !
These days its an common business tactic to get you spend money on crappy products is The looks... We all fall for looks and later find out what's really cooking under the hood. iPhone... iKea.... iLoveU..
Once you start learning the crooked product, it tells you - FMP does not use Simple Queries, but under the hood it uses a new set of good looking UI elements called Table of occurrences. An under the hood of table occurrences are base tables. (Mind you, for a Database Pro - meaning Professionals in Engineering and Professional developers - these are minor troubles. These are people for whom "WORK" is learning new things about such databases. Unlike users like us who wants to get our work done with minimum hassle.)
You end up learning scores of FMP proprietary techniques to re-invent the wheel. Table of occurences which basically say "SELECT * from TABLE.. to create a dataset from the base table. You can then graphically connect these TOs and build a query. Sounds cool. But it gets limited for bigger queries and cannot create any dynamic queries. SQL is a taboo in this Database.
-- "We haven't got nothing with SQL, Man ! I didnt see no nuthin' about SQL "
To show or hide an object like a button, you have to add it into a "Portal", then using a Table Occurence and its graphic connections, you show or hide the object depending on whether a record is present in the table or not. I find it more easy to use (Access or Javascript in XAMP) something like Button.Visible="False"
You want to add features to the interface like Timers or A tree view of your records.. FMP Database pros will tell you - Not yet in FMP, go and learn JAVA, UNIX, Perl, Javascript and so forth. (Hmm.. May be XAMP is easier than I thought after trying Filemaker ? ). Now Filemaker supports PHP but you stilll have to learn the XAM part later !!
What if you want to see the data you store in your database as an excel spreadsheet or a powerpoint presentation. Sorry... Now FMP will say that FMP is aimed at "Niche Markets" only.. They dont care much about small businesses and common people like you... The best advice from them is to wait till your company adopts filemaker into their business and then you too can learn the contraption to impress your boss.
At times you might want to save an image or two in your database for Tracking items in your Garage sale or for a Research database I use for my studies. In Access you can save it as an attachment in a field and the field can contain multiple attachments. In filemaker.. it means more Table of Occurences and more jumbled relationship graphs. Tell that to a FMP Developer or at an FMP forum and they will start with Relational database theory, and the problems that you can get into when your database scales to contain Terabytes of data. Terabytes of data from a Garage sale or a Research Database? Will make you feel that one day you will overtake Amazon.com or become the next rocket scientist. And as usual you will not get any definite answers.
With the effort you might want put to learn FMP, I suggest you are better off learning XAMP on your Mac. Or Acess/MS SQL and VB on windows. No! you dont have to get rid of your Mac yet. Your iPhone and iTunes still need it !! I learned FMP at 5.5 and since then every year I have been learning "Powerful" ways to scratch my head. At work I still use the easy to use Access and my company uses MS SQL. I hope my company will adopt filemaker soon that I can show them a trick or two while getting my work done.
Finally, I gave it a second star for being able to trap more users into trouble while taking advantage of its "Mac friendly database banner"
GREAT AS ALWAYS 2008-07-15
I've used Filemaker for years to organize and manage my database of clients. It's also wonderful to use for Invoicing - allowing the user to be able to manage their invoicing in whatever way they dream possible. To sort by Client, by project, invoice number, address, job amounts, City, etc... If you have a business I think Filemaker is an invaluable tool. I also use it for mailings and to create personalized form letters. The only limitation with Filemaker is your imagination (and learning how to use it if you don't commit yourself to figuring out how to do what you want to do.) It's a little complex but you'll figure it out with dedication to reading the manual.
Great software 
2008-07-13
This is a great software, I just wish I had known to get the advanced as I'm hoping to do a lot of programming and the advanced version has some really great features that I didn't know about.
Don
The only place I could find to start! 2008-06-15
All the time in my life I tried to get answers on how to make a search engine, I could not find anything anywhere with endless circles, but it was only Filemaker Pro (nine) that was helpful, which was the first step in the right direction. It was all too easy to do (and learn at the same time.) Coming with it's free simple tutorials (including an interactive video on itself), and much online help with various other references and instances, AND as well as having an already pre-built databases examples in the Program made the learning and doing extremely breezey (Poof! As if the 'how-to-database' issue ever existed!), and not only that, everything I needed was all there and all in one place! If you're looking for a place to start on databases, and can't find answers anywhere else, this one is WELL worth the investment.
Excellent Choice for Mac or Windows 2008-06-09
Have used MS Access in years past and was looking for a database file that would work on my Mac. Filemaker Pro 9 works great and is both very flexible and easy to use. Even the Help files are pretty decent. Recommend this program highly.
good database software 2008-05-27
Filemaker is a reliable and easy to use relational database program. The pre-designed formats are very business-oriented rather than adapted to science and research applications, but it is easy to put together whatever is needed.
