But if you had date, time or timestamp fields in your file, those would remain available, too, in case you wanted to do some math on them. In this example, that leaves only Goodness Rating, which is automatically selected. Since averages only make sense for numbers, FileMaker grays out any non-number fields in the Available Field list. The Options for Summary Field dialog box makes its second appearance.
With Summary selected in the Type pop-up menu, click Create. Remember, field names can be about as long as you want. In the Field Name box, type Average of Goodness Rating. It would also be nice to be able to summarize the Goodness Rating information. That piece of information is much more useful than it sounds you'll be using it to find out interesting things soon. You now have a field that helps you find out how many people are in the database. But bewareif you forget to type somebody's first name in a new record, that person doesn't get included in the count.įileMaker adds the new field to the field list. Since every person has a first name, this field counts every record. What does that mean? Simple: If a record has something in the First Name field, it gets counted, but if the First Name field is blank, FileMaker skips the entire record. For example, this field counts the First Name field. From the Available Fields list, choose First Name.Ī summary field is always based on some other field in the database. In this case, you want it to count things. This window also shows up if, in the Define Database window, you select a Summary field and click Options.Ī summary field can perform one of seven summary calculations. Unlike the field types you've used so far, a summary field has options that must be set for it to be usable, so FileMaker shows you those options right away. The Options for Summary Field dialog box appears when you make a new summary field. The Options for Summary Field window appears (Figure 6-39).įigure 6-39. From the Type pop-up menu, choose Summary, and then click Create. You're going to use this summary field to count the people in your database. Then, in the Field Name box, type Count of People.Ī summary field, like any other, has a name. In the Define Database window, choose the Fields tab. In the People database, choose File Define Database. Creating summary fields is much easier than describing what they do, as you can see from the following example. Instead, summary fields gather up and process data from several records. In Chapter 3, you learned that a summary field isn't associated with records like the other field types (Section 3.3). To get summary information, you need summary fields. #How to insert page breaks in field filemaker how to#
In Chapter 5, you learned how to create reports that show lists of records, but they don't include any so-called summary data.
FileMaker's not only fantastic at showing you information, it also excels at helping you see what it all means.
In other words, a well-designed report summarizes the data for you.
But a report that divides that information into 25 music genres, each with sales totals, both in aggregate and by gender, helps you interpret all those reams of data at a glance. If you want to understand your customer's music tastes, a report of 200,000 individual CD sales won't do you much good: The information is in there somewhere, but your feeble mind stands no chance of ferreting it out. But people aren't so good at dealing with all that detail (hence the invention of the database). A database excels at keeping track of thingsitsy bitsy teeny tiny details about hundreds, thousands, even millions of little things.
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