Josh, You're very welcome. I just want to elaborate on a couple things:
Josh Mellicker wrote >> Good luck! All a FileMaker user has to do is click a checkbox and their >> database is multiuser. > > I should have said "multiuser worldwide from a fast server"... sorry! You can make a database available worldwide from your home cable connection (I do it all the time with my 8M/768K line); you can also go with one of the larger hosting companies who have multiple OC3 connections. There's really no difference between the speed or accessibility of FileMaker database serving vs. MySQL database serving. The only difference is that MySQL is more "ubiquitous" given it is part of the "LAMP" platform that so many budget hosting companies use. > I just did a tiny amount of research, and it seems Filemaker hosting is > typically $20 - $100 per month per database, and has user limits (like 20 > users max). I will look into it more, but so far it does not seem like a > good solution for a large scale project where several hundred people > might be connected at once, it seems like the price would be > astronomical. Allow me to address this in-depth. 1) You'll find that the budget cPanel/LAMP providers also limit you, though their limitations are not as clearly spelled out. Some let you have only 1 to 5 MySQL databases. Other limits have to do with bandwidth and disk space. Almost all shared hosting providers will shut you down for excessive CPU usage. Bottom line is, I really doubt that you'd be able to host a hundred concurrent users for $9.95/month. Now, about FileMaker. The hosting providers are pretty much all running FileMaker Server 8 Advanced. This has the following limits: - 125 databases - 250 concurrent FileMaker client sessions - 100 concurrent Instant Web Publishing sessions Now, this at first glance seems to be fairly severe. However, 2) The database limit is not a "table" limit. Most users need only a single database, because each database can hold an essentially unlimited number of tables. 3) The FileMaker client sessions is an issue only for people who want to access the database using the FileMaker software. The context we're talking about here is Web access. So, yes, if you're distributing a solution based on the FileMaker software than only 250 at one time can be using it at once. This situation would mostly arise in corporate/vertical situations. But, if you look at the economies of this, once you get to this level of development you're probably not going to have 250 FileMaker clients. Rather, you're going to have a mix where there is a select number of FileMaker clients and the rest of the organization is accessing via some form of Web/Browser interface. 4) The Instant Web Publishing sessions also seem pretty limited, until you realize that reaching this number of simultaneous sessions is a challenge. Most FileMaker shared hosting services are able to max out their server's customers before they hit the IWP concurrent session limit. For example, a solution I have which serves a hospital of about 8500 staff is used daily but rarely has more than 30 concurrent IWP sessions at any given time. IWP, while it has the advantage of being the easiest and quickest way to get your FileMaker database on the Web, is not the most sophisticated or economical method once you get to scale. The main advantage of it is that your layouts, scripts, overall look-and-feel are the same as they are in FileMaker itself. This means you don't need to know any PHP, HTML, etc, to have *very* sophisticated database systems live online, instantly. The session limits are there because the server is essentially emulating a FileMaker client internally for each active web user. 5) IWP is just one way to get on the Web. FileMaker does not have these limits for its so-called "custom web publishing" options, which include XML/XSLT, PHP, and Lasso. These methods do not have "sessions." So, go ahead and build your DHTML site with Cascading Style Sheets and whatever you like. Break out your copy of Dreamweaver or whatever editor you prefer. You'll be able to talk with the FileMaker database quite easily without worrying about how many concurrent users you have. These are the same tools you would use to present an SQL database online. The difference is that you will be able to open up your copy of FileMaker to manage the database backend or prototype solutions anytime -- and enjoy its integrated development tools instead of cobbling together various utilities, running the SQL command line, or clicking through phpMyAdmin. In other words, in a comparison of MySQL/PHP vs. FileMaker/PHP, FileMaker still comes out on top in terms of rapid application development, because the PHP (et. al.) element is the same for both. As you can see from ongoing hosting cost is not a factor for developing a FileMaker/PHP or FileMaker/XML/XSLT/CSS solution vs. LAMP. And it may not be an issue for hosting IWP or FileMaker-based clients, either. > We are running about 30 - 35 MySQL databases on our dedicated server > currently, and have several hundred people using them at once, not sure > if FileMaker can scale to that or beyond... we pay $150 monthly, but have > unlimited MySQL databases with unlimited connections. You are running a dedicated server from a hosting company for $150/month? Nice deal :) Were it me, I would probably go with a co-location deal where I provide the hardware and software and just pay for bandwidth. It will be more expensive up-front, but the monthly costs would be lower. My hosting company would give me 1U rackspace and ample bandwidth for about $40/month. I'm sure FileMaker could scale to that level of use via custom web publishing, and perhaps even IWP. It all depends on what "using them at once" means. > I don't think Filemaker has the power that, for example, Trevor has given > Revolution with the QT external where you can detect timecode tracks in > QT movies, or copy and paste segments. I know this is unusual, but our > customers are video producers so the apps I need to build need to > manipulate media as well as data. FileMaker has a well-documented plugin architecture as well. One certainly could write a plug-in to handle multimedia the way you're describing. Perhaps Trevor could repurpose his code for such a plugin and make a little more profit from it, or maybe someone has already written one :) Best wishes on your efforts... if there were a tool that let me build/manage LAMP database-driven solutions as quickly, easily and neatly as a FileMaker solution, I'd sure buy it! Especially if it was based on Rev! But today I still don't have a decent table object and all the other stuff I mentioned in my earlier post I'd have to roll on my own. I've always thought that Claris should have somehow merged HyperCard and FileMaker when they had the chance. (How sweet would that marriage have been!) Like I said, FileMaker is not always the best solution. I don't think you could run Amazon.com with it (though many large companies DO deploy massive solutions with FileMaker as the backend.) You definitely have more control over the user interface of any client application (executable). A Revolution-based solution that talks to a MySQL backend could well be more powerful in the end (after much more development work). I just want you to base your decision on accurate understandings. So, have you downloaded your FileMaker 8 demo yet? :) By the way... have a visit to comp.databases.filemaker on UseNet. Good place to get lots of opinions on this stuff and pointers to even more resources. Bill _______________________________________________ use-revolution mailing list [email protected] Please visit this url to subscribe, unsubscribe and manage your subscription preferences: http://lists.runrev.com/mailman/listinfo/use-revolution
