linking 2 fm databases

General support questions.
Posts: 26
Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 12:52 pm
PostPosted: Fri Dec 12, 2008 1:08 pm
Hi - I am new to filemaker and to seedcode. I created a database using fmp version 9 to store info on some properties. I need to bring this into seedcode complete and link the properties with my contacts. My contacts may be involved with many properties and my properties may be owned by many of my contacts. The relationship table in seedcode complete is downright intimidating to me and I don't know where to begin. Any help or a point in the right direction would be greatly appreciated.

I also need to add a group and a sub-group field to my contacts that can be used to sort the contacts, I have tried adding this to the contacts table and it looks good but I am not able to perform a sort based on either of these fields. Again, any help would be much appreciated!

Thanks!
SeedCode Staff
SeedCode Staff
Posts: 2764
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2003 11:01 am
PostPosted: Mon Dec 15, 2008 8:34 am
Hi Shelly,

I'm not sure why your sorting might not be working; feel free to post some more details and I'll see if I can help.

When it comes to your properties table, however, you have a couple options.

One is to use our Projects table for your properties. Projects are already linked to contacts and to appointments and invoices, so you'd already have a lot of integration going for you. To to this you'd add to Projects any fields which are specific to your properties table and then import your properties into Projects.

Of course, if you have projects reserved for something else you can add a new table for properties to SeedCode Complete.

With either approach you'll have to work on the way contacts are linked to Projects / Properties. Each Project in SeedCode Complete is linked to one contact, and it sounds like that will need to be changed. You'll want to create a join table between contacts and Projects / Properties so that a contact can be linked to more than one property. This join table would only need 3 real fields: the ID of the contact, the ID of the project (property), and possibly a field for the contact's "role" at that property (owner, advisor). This is something you should be able to add to our calendar and we could coach you through it if you get stuck.

Since you say you're new to FileMaker then making this join table might be a big step. You may want to check out FileMaker's training book which has a great section on relationships. It uses the example of teachers and students where one teacher is related to many students (and each student has multiple teachers) through the "join table" of a student's classes. You can find this book here:

https://store.filemaker.com/product/vie ... amily/FMPT

I hope that helps get you started.
John Sindelar
SeedCode
Posts: 26
Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 12:52 pm
PostPosted: Mon Dec 15, 2008 1:16 pm
Hi John - Thanks for your quick response! I am going to do just as you said and use the Projects table for my properties.

Now about the join table, I'm not sure where to put it. There is a Contact table with a relationship to a ContactProject table; is this where the join table belongs or does it belong between the Project table and the ProjectContact table or do I put a join table between both of these?

Thanks again!
SeedCode Staff
SeedCode Staff
Posts: 2764
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2003 11:01 am
PostPosted: Mon Dec 15, 2008 1:48 pm
Very good! ...between both.
John Sindelar
SeedCode
Posts: 26
Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 12:52 pm
PostPosted: Mon Dec 15, 2008 4:42 pm
I might actually be getting the hang of this!

Thanks so much for the help!
Posts: 26
Joined: Mon Dec 08, 2008 12:52 pm
PostPosted: Thu Dec 18, 2008 11:16 am
Hi John,

So much for getting the hang of this! I created a join table to go between the Contact Table and the ContactProject Table. I added two fields; ContactID and ProjectID. I can link the ProjectContactID (foreign key) in the ContactProject Table to my ProjectID in the new join table. When I try to link to either the foreign key (ContactCompanyID) or the primary key (ContactID) in the ContactTable I get a message stating that there cannot be more than one relational path between any two tables in the graph and that another occurrence of one of the tables must be added to the graph. What do you suggest I do about this?

Thanks in advance!
SeedCode Staff
SeedCode Staff
Posts: 2764
Joined: Thu Nov 20, 2003 11:01 am
PostPosted: Thu Dec 18, 2008 11:24 am
Right. The join you created goes between Contact and ContactProject IN PLACE OF the relationship already there between them. So you're very close.
John Sindelar
SeedCode

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