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I wrote an article in For FileMaker Issue #24 about creating an “opener file” that would open FileMaker Pro, and automatically open a hosted file. A few years have passed since then, and I feel it’s time to update that article with a method that I use every day.
For several versions, FileMaker has had the ability to recognize a certain URL format. Here’s a sample:
fmp7://yourserver.com/yourfile.fp7Entering this string in a browser will launch FileMaker Pro and open yourfile.fp7 from the host yourserver.com. If you don’t have your server set up so you can refer to it by a name, like yourserver.com, use the server’s IP address (E.g. 192.168.1.250).
Once you’ve figured out the URL that will work from your browser, select the URL string and drag it to your desktop (on Windows, use Internet Explorer as FireFox won’t let you do this). In both OSX and Windows XP, a file will be created that contains that string. When you double-click the file, it launches FileMaker Pro and opens the file from the host.
If your hosted file is protected with an account and password, it’s possible to pass that information along with the name and location of the file. Here’s a sample:
fmp7://username:password@yourserver.com/yourfile.fp7If for some reason your URL doesn’t open FileMaker, or if you get a message that the FMP7 protocol isn’t recognized, you may need an update to FileMaker Pro. There was an update to FileMaker Pro 8.0 that mistakenly removed this functionality on Windows computers. Re-installing FileMaker Pro 8.0 and applying the v3 update will fix this problem. There should be no problems with FileMaker Pro 8.5.
