Publishing on the Web

Alas, FileMaker's Web Companion is not what it once was. In version 5, FileMaker has moved what was called Custom Web Publishing to the FileMaker Pro 5 Developer edition, which costs $499 and is generally used by programmers creating custom, corporate-sized databases. If you're just using the regular edition of FileMaker, you're limited to Instant Web Publishing. The good news: Instant Web Publishing now is easier to set up. The bad news: Its capabilities are a bit more limited. The biggest drawback is that a Web database cannot be shared with more than 10 Web computers in a rolling 12-hour period (Figure 18.1). (For details, see IP Guest Limit on page 268.) If you want to share the database over the Web with more than that number, you'll have to upgrade to the FileMaker Pro 5 Unlimited edition, which costs $999.

Still, the advantages of FileMaker's Web Companion remain great: Any computer with a Web browser can view and (if you allow it) even edit FileMaker data. Your company's sales force can place orders from the road, outside vendors can check delivery dates, and you can check the latest product deadlines from home. Don't worry--Web Companion includes security options to let you precisely control who sees your data and what they can do with it. Timeliness is one of the best things about Web database publishing. Much of the Web uses static pages, which look the same every time you visit them. In contrast, Web Companion's dynamic pages change constantly because they are directly linked to the FileMaker data used to create the page.

Figure 18.1  The bad news: The Web Companion now imposes a limit of 10 users (IP Guest Limit) in a rolling 12-hour period.

• How It Works and What You'll Need
• Setting Up and Configuring the Web Companion
• Web Companion Options
• Sharing and Viewing Web Files
• Setting Up the Browser Views
• Testing Your Web Database Locally
• Once You Publish the Database