FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
WAVES IN MOTION RELEASES ANALYZER 1.0 FOR FILEMAKER
New development tool thoroughly documents and analyzes FileMaker projects.
Contact:
Vince Menanno
Waves in Motion
Phone: 416-760-9959
Fax: 416-760-8849
E-mail: info@wmotion.com
Web: http://www.wmotion.com
152 Evelyn Avenue, Suite 101
Toronto, Ontario M6P 2Z7
TORONTO, Canada. April 27, 1998. Ask a room full of FileMaker developers
what they like least about their job, and most will tell you it’s the
prospect of making changes to projects with hundreds or even thousands of
elements, where something as simple as deleting a single field can affect
any number of layouts, calculations, relationships, and scripts.
This is a problem Vince Menanno knows all too well. As the principal of
Waves in Motion, he has been working with FileMaker for almost a decade.
“Sure, with a new project you have the time to organize everything from
scratch,” he says. “But all too often I’m called in to fix someone else’s
project. Things are all over the place and there’s no documentation, or
it’s a database that’s been worked on by too many different people.”
Frustrated with FileMaker’s limited development tools, Vince has drawn on
this experience and developed the Analyzer, a development tool that clearly
and automatically documents every element of a FileMaker project: every
field, every layout, every relationship, every value list, and every
script.
Depending on their needs, developers can use the Analyzer to generate
summarized or detailed project reports. To choose one example: the detailed
report for a particular field includes a list of all the layouts that
include the field, every script that uses the field, every relationship
that references the field, and every calculation that requires a value from
that field. Analyzer indicates the type for each field, if a field is
indexed or not, and the number of repetitions for each field. For
calculation fields, Analyzer displays the calculation and the field type
returned by the calculation.
All this is information thoroughly cross-referenced in its own FileMaker
database. The script report for each field, for example, includes a list of
each script that uses that field, while the report for each script contains
a complete list of the fields included in that script.
With this kind of detail, clearly structured and cataloged in a series of
simple layouts, it’s also quick and easy to search for pretty much
anything, by the name of an element or for a particular string within the
elements. You can, for instance, search through all the scripts in a
project for outdated procedures or elements that no longer exist.
Or you can use the tools built into the Analyzer to trace the behavior of
your FileMaker scripts. Click on a reference to an external script, and the
Analyzer instantly shows you that script. Move through the script step by
step, or let the Analyzer trace through an entire script for you and build
a hierarchical report of every instruction, every external script, and
every recursion. These trace reports are color-coded, and the structure is
collapsible to help you better see just what is going on.
Vince was even able to use the Analyzer to analyze itself! “This sort of
information was invaluable to my debugging efforts,” he says. “The more
complex the project, the greater the need for a tool to organize the work,
document all the elements, and analyze the flaws. Even the most experienced
FileMaker developer will save valuable time and effort with a tool like
this.”
You can download the Macintosh version of Analyzer 1.0 right now from:
(http://www.wmotion.com/products.html)
This version allows you to try out all the features of the Analyzer, but
does not allow you to save your work. You can purchase a registration code
for $99.00 US (or $159.00 after June 1, 1998) by downloading the following
order form and contacting Waves in Motion by phone or fax.
(http://www.wmotion.com/Analyzer_OrderForm.pdf.sit.hqx)
Current registered users of Waves in Motion’s application DocuScript are
entitled to a free upgrade to Analyzer 1.0 and will receive a new
registration code via eMail.
Waves in Motion is the developer of several FileMaker solutions, including
The Dragon-Web Surveys and DocuScript. They are active members of the
FileMaker Solution Alliance and the Apple Developer Program, and have been
consulting and developing FileMaker solutions since 1990.
Waves in Motion
152 Evelyn ave suite 101
Toronto, Ontario
M6P 2Z7
Voice: (416) 760-9959
Fax: (416) 760-8849
eMail: info@www.wmotion.com
Web site: http://www.wmotion.com