• Contact details & purchase information

• Intro
• In use
• Features
• Reviews
• Tips
• Case studies
• FSA listing

Find mode

The whole point of a database is to store large amounts of data and then ask useful questions of it to turn that data into information. In FileMaker, Find mode is where you ask these questions.

FileMaker uses a process called query by example: fill in the criteria you’re looking for in the fields you want it to appear, and FileMaker finds all the records that match. To find all the people called Smith in your contacts database, enter Find mode (Command-F), click the surname field, type Smith, and hit the Find button. The result, known as the found set, is a list of contacts whose second name contains Smith.

By default, when you switch to Find mode, you have just one find request—what looks like an empty record for you to fill in with your find criteria. However, you can combine more than one request to find those records that match one thing OR another. To create a second find request, choose RequestsAdd New Request or press Command-N.

If you were to type Jones into the surname field of this request (alongside the Smith in the first reequest) then hitting find would produce a list of all records matching either Smith or Jones. To search for records matching one criteria AND another criteria, you need to put the criteria in the same record. Adding CEO into the title field of your Jones request would produce a list contacts called Smith and CEOs called Jones.

1. Layout choice: It’s often easier to create multiple find requests in table view, as shown here.

2. Mode selection: Find mode is accessed by clicking the Magnifier icon here, pressing Command-F, choosing Find from the pop-up menu at the bottom of the window, or choosing ViewFind Mode. If you’ve just performed a find, you can also come back to the find mode with your previous request filled in by choosing RecordsModify Last Find or pressing Command-R.

3. Wildcards and symbols: FileMaker also provides a way to search in a less-precise fashion. The pop-up menu has a list of shortcuts for Wildcard characters to insert into find requests to broaden a search, without having multiple find requests.

   For example, searching for J@n@s, which contains the @ wildcard that matches any single character, would find Jones, Jonas, Janus but not Judas or Finis. You can also specify ranges of values using three dots (…) so searching for 6/4/2004…5/4/2005 in a date field would find records dated in this financial year.

4. Multiple requests: Combine requests to narrow a search. Here we’re looking for people called Jones, Jonas, Janus or Smith who don’t have an email address containing .com.

5. Omit: By checking Omit with a find request selected you’re saying But Not…. This lets you narrow a search for, say, contacts called Smith But Not John Smith.