ActiveX in FM7

[MrEase]

I find the documentation on how to use ActiveX (through Visual Basic) with FM7 very limited, does anyone know any better resources?

[MrEase]

to specify in more details here's my doubts:

 

I don't know anything about VB and have to adapt a script to use it with Filemaker 7... following details found of different sources and adapting what I had from version 6 I get the following in VB:

 

Dim FMDocs As FMPRO70Lib.Documents

Dim FMDoc As FMPRO70Lib.Document

Dim FMApp As FMPRO70Lib.Application

 

Set FMApp = CreateObject("FMPRO70Lib.Application")

Set FMDocs = FMApp.Documents

Set FMDoc = FMDoc.Open("C:\AcredSys\foto.fp7", "", "")

 

Somehow I get an error at the line of CreateObject. I have tried with

Set FMApp = CreateObject("FMPRO.Application") but it won't work either.

[Felix Kortrijk]

Hello Henk,

 

I am not sure what it is you want Filemaker to do from VB.

Below please find some code I came up with for testing script process speed.

It originally uses code from within a Word document (Macro) but it can also be easily converted to a full .exe program in VB.

 

Code:

 

'Purpose of program:

'Benchmarking of Filemaker scripts

'Timing in Filemaker is too crude as the minimal

'time measurement is 1 second

'Fractions of a second can not be displayed in filemaker.

 

'--------------------------------------------------------------

 

'Make a reference to the Filemaker Pro 7.0 Type library before writing any

'further code or running this project

'--------------------------------------------------------------

 

'For Filemaker 5.0 /5.5 or 6.0 use the references to those Type Libraries

'Rename all objects from FMPRO70LIB.xxxxxx to FMPRO50LIB.xxxxxx

 

'--------------------------------------------------------------

 

Dim FMApp As FMPRO70Lib.Application

Dim FMDBs As FMPRO70Lib.Documents

Dim FMActiveDoc As FMPRO70Lib.Document

 

'Note: A command button named "cmdOpenDB" is needed on the form or Word document

 

Private Sub cmdOpenDB_Click()

OpenDatabases

End Sub

 

'Note: A command button named "cmdClearTimelist" is needed on the form or Word document

 

Private Sub CmdClearTimelist_Click()

lstTimeResult.Clear

End Sub

 

'Note: A command button named "cmdRunscript" is needed on the form or Word document

 

Private Sub cmdRunscript_Click()

Run_script

End Sub

 

 

Private Sub Run_script()

'Run a script in Filemaker, called from within the VB program (or Word/Excel document)

Dim Start As Double

Dim Finish As Double

Dim Status As Integer

lblScriptStatus = "Script not active"

 

Set FMApp = CreateObject("FMPRO.Application")

' Set the documents object with the correct path and filename.

Set FMDBs = FMApp.Documents

 

'Listbox named lstOpenDbs must be present on the form or document

If lstOpenDbs.Text "" Then

'Open the Filemaker file with username Admin and in this case empty password.

Set FMActiveDoc = FMDBs.Open(lstOpenDbs.Text, "Admin", "")

MsgBox ("Now activated: " & FMActiveDoc.FullName), , "Message"

 

'Start running the script

Start = Timer

'Textbox named txtScriptname must be present on the form or document

FMActiveDoc.DoFMScript (txtScriptname.Text)

lblScriptStatus = "Script active"

Status = FMApp.ScriptStatus

While FMApp.ScriptStatus 0

DoEvents

Wend

Finish = Timer

'If a typo is made in the scriptname no script will be executed

'but no error message comes back from filemaker either

 

'Label named lblScriptstatus must be present on the form or document

If Status = 0 Then lblScriptStatus = "Script not executed"

 

If Status = 1 Then lblScriptStatus = "Error within script"

If Status = 2 Then

lblScriptStatus = "Script executed"

'Add the scriptname and the resulted time to the result list

lstTimeResult.AddItem txtScriptname.Text & ": " & Round((Finish - Start), 3)

End If

End If

 

'Clean up, destroy all created objects

Set FMDBs = Nothing

Set FMActiveDoc = Nothing

Set FMApp = Nothing

 

End Sub

 

'Purpose:

'Find all the databases which are currently open

'Display all the filenames in a listbox (clickable for further use)

'This makes other code more flexible as filenames are not hardcoded

 

Private Sub FindOpenDBs()

Set FMApp = CreateObject("FMPRO.Application")

Set FMDBs = FMApp.Documents

Dim Tempdb As FMPRO70Lib.Document

Dim Opendbs As String

Dim OpenDocs As String

On Error GoTo ErrorHandler

lstOpenDbs.Clear

 

If FMDBs.Count > 0 Then

For Each Tempdb In FMDBs

Opendbs = Tempdb.FullName

lstOpenDbs.AddItem Opendbs

Set Tempdb = Nothing

Next

End If

Set FMApp = Nothing

Exit Sub

ErrorHandler:

MsgBox "Filemaker has no files open"

End Sub

 

 

Private Sub Document_Open()

'On opening the Word document, the lists with previous results are wiped clean

lstOpenDbs.Clear

lstTimeResult.Clear

End Sub

 

Private Sub ListOpenDbs_Click()

lstOpenDbs.Clear

FindOpenDBs

End Sub

 

 

Greets,

 

Felix

[MrEase]

thanks Felix, good example

[Felix Kortrijk]

I see that there is some interest in this code. I have tinkered with it some more and uploaded it to our website.

You can download a zip copy of the actual Word 2000 document from:

www.dataclip.nl/Demo_files/fmp7_runscript.zip

 

By the way I found a nice quirk in FM: the active X calling of a script only works if you have the script flagged as "show in menu" in scriptmaker.

 

Felix