We recently had a client asking how to connect to Oracle database with MBS Xojo SQL Plugin. So first install Instant Client. For that download it, unzip the folder and put it somewhere you like to have it, e.g. in a C:\Oracle folder. Next you need to add the folder to the PATH variable, so you go to My Computer -> Properties -> Advanced -> Environment Variables -> PATH and add in the list as first item the path to the folder with the instant client libraries, e.g. C:\Oracle\instantclient_19_3.
Now you can use SQLDatabaseMBS or SQLConnectionMBS classes to connect. You may need to specify the database connection string. As we use Oracle, it starts with "Oracle:", so SQLDatabaseMBS knows which driver to use. Next you specify hostname with optional port and service name in format <hostname>[:<port>][/<service_name>]. Please also set option with kOptionLibraryOracle constant to the path pointing to the DLL file. You can either use SetFileOption with folder item, Option() with file path or just let it away and the plugin will look for oci.dll itself. Here some example code:
Dim db AsNew SQLDatabaseMBS
//whereistheoci.dlllibrary?Dim fa As FolderItem = GetFolderItem("C:\Oracle\instantclient_19_3\oci.dll", FolderItem.PathTypeNative)
DB.SetFileOption(SQLConnectionMBS.kOptionLibraryOracle, fa)
DB.DatabaseName = "Oracle:" + "localhost:1521/XE"
DB.UserName = "zEPI"
DB.Password = "root"if DB.Connect then
MsgBox "Weareconnected.ServerVersion:" + db.ServerVersionString
else
MsgBox db.ErrorMessage
endif
Please do not hesitate to contact us with your questions.
If you need to read HEIF or HEIC image files (High Efficiency Image File Format) in FileMaker on Mac or iOS, please check our Container.ReadImage function in MBS FileMaker Plugin:
Set Variable [ $path ; Value: "/Users/cs/Desktop/IMG_3552.HEIC" ]
So we may need to import the file into a container value first, if you haven't it in a container field already. Second, we use Container.ReadImage to read the image and convert it to a PNG file. PNG supports transparency and has lossless compression, so we prefer it over JPEG.
Alternatively you can use CGImageSource functions and get the images and any metadata like this:
Set Variable [ $path ; Value: "/Users/cs/Desktop/IMG_3552.HEIC" ]
Originally pointed to by Paul Lefebvre's tweet, I quickly subscribed as they talk about various topics for independent app developers and those episodes are very interesting. They face similar issues as myself and so I like to hear their solutions.
Thanks to David Smith and Marco Arment for their apps and the podcast.
Thanks to Xojo Inc. for supporting the shows.
Do you like this podcast? Or any other good podcasts not to miss?
Monkeybread Software today is proud to announce Combine PDFs 5.4, an update to their popular PDF merge and split tool for Mac OS. With a focus on ease-of-use, Combine PDFs is a lightweight utility which allows anyone to merge PDF files and images into a single PDF file. The user need only drag & drop files onto the program icon. The main window appears, allowing the user to set the order in which the files are joined.
For the next MBS Filemaker Plugins, we worked on including the Vision framework from Apple. Currently we have six new Vision functions. We even include the new features coming with MacOS 10.15 Catalina release.
The Vision framework performs face and face landmark detection, text detection, barcode recognition, image registration, and general feature tracking. Vision also allows the use of custom Core ML models for tasks like classification or object detection.
For the next MBS Xojo Plugins, we worked on including the Vision framework from Apple. Our new vision plugin part (in MacFrameworks) covers the whole framework with all 49 classes and one module for globals. We even include the new features coming with MacOS 10.15 Catalina release. All functions can be used asynchronously with delegates for the callbacks. The plugin makes sure those callbacks execute on main thread to avoid threading issues in Xojo.
The Vision framework performs face and face landmark detection, text detection, barcode recognition, image registration, and general feature tracking. Vision also allows the use of custom Core ML models for tasks like classification or object detection.
With Catalina you also get classification, text recognition, attention and object based saliency, animal and human detection.
Since July 2019 we offers a new version of our FileMaker Plugin. Let me show you the new function and how you can use it.
New functions for better working with the MBS FileMaker Plugin
Maybe you have asked yourself how often you use the MBS FileMaker Plugin. Now you can answer this question by using the "Plugin.CallCounter" function. This function shows you how many times you called a MBS FileMaker Plugin function. The call of this function also counts.
For a better debugging of the MBS FileMaker Plugin we developed the “Plugin.InstallSignalHandlers” function. With this function you install the signal handler invoked by the OS when the application crashes. Thats helps to detect what and where exactly is the problem. Usually you call this function only if we ask you to help on debugging a crash on Linux or MacOS. Our plugin then prints a backtrace to show where the crash happened.
New possibilities in debugging
New for the debugging is the Trace.SetErrorsOnly function. If you call this and use our Trace functions you log only the MBS FileMaker Plugin calls that return errors. Whether this option is set can be queried with the Trace.GetErrorsOnly function. With Trace.SetWithTimes the time is additionally logged. Trace.GetWithTimes evaluates whether this option is set.
A helping tool for command line tools debugging is the new Shell.GetArguments function. This function query a list of all arguments of the shell. Use it to look whether an argument that you need is missing.
Test your XML import
For better XML import debugging we offers you the XML.Import.Errors function, which list all errors. It only reports each error once. With XML.Import.ErrorCount you can count the errors. Because of this you can learn, whether you had errors during the import.
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Please visit the Find a Developer website on Xojo.com to submit a job offer or a consultation request. Your job offer is forwarded to a list of Xojo developers, who may contact you for details and make an offer to help.
Looking for work?
If you are professionally working with Xojo as a development tool, you probably already have a Xojo Pro license. With that license comes access to a special forum section for consulting leads, where the requests from the find a developer form above are posted as well as any direct inquires to Xojo's customer support.
An official Xojo Consultants list
We made recently the case in Feedback for an official Xojo consultants list. See Feedback Case 55135. We see the benefits of the FileMaker Business Alliance and would enjoy a similar program for Xojo to increase visibility of the thousands of Xojo developers out there. We tried ourselves to make such a list for Germany, but it needs to be integrated with the Xojo website and accounts.
For example it could be that there is a checkbox in the Xojo account to request being listed on a consulting list, just like the checkbox for the beta program. Xojo Inc. could ask you to provide details for a listing if they accept your wish. By making it dependent on having an active Pro license, they could make sure you can serve all customers as you can use all product features. It may be a good idea to ask for an example of your work to see if you are indeed doing development on a professional level. And if you quit Xojo and stop updating your license, you would automatically be delisted. Great way to avoid having outdated entries in the list.
If you check the FBA requirements, you may see that beside the fee to pay and having a postal address, you need to be one year in business, show customer references and show a sample of custom app work. In the FBA program, you can improve your listing with taking the certification test, but that may be a different topic for Xojo.
Vom 16. bis 19. Oktober 2019 findet die zehnte deutschsprachige FileMaker Konferenz in Hamburg, Deutschland statt. FileMaker Anwender und Entwickler sind herzlich eingeladen sich anzumelden.
Die Veranstalter vom Verein FM Konferenz erwarten auch 2019 rund 180 Entwickler, Anwender, IT-Fachleute und Entscheidungsträger aus Wirtschaft, Bildung und Verwaltung. Rund um über 25 Fachvorträge und Workshops wird es viel Zeit zum Vernetzen in den gemeinsamen Pausen und beim Abendprogramm geben.
Dieses Jahr gibt es wieder eine MBS Plugin Workshop, diesmal am 16. Oktober 2019 von ca. 9 bis 17 Uhr. Anmeldung bei Monkeybread Software.
Just one month left for the early bird offer to XOJO.CONNECT event hosted by Xojo Inc.
Tickets are available for $799 USD till 15th September 2019.
It will be held March 25-27, 2020 in Nashville, TN at the Sheraton Music City Hotel. Registration is currently $200 off full price till 15th Sep 2019 ($799 instead of $999). Please sign up early to get the best deal.
Check out our conference highlights video if you want to see what it's like - or ask one of the many attendees from the forum!
Looking for a conference this year? Join the European Xojo Conference 2019 in Cologne, October 24-25th.
FileMaker itself understands a few text encodings. And with our various plugin formats we offer them directly to use within the plugin. We usually only document the short list: ANSI, Mac, Latin1, ISO-8859-1, Windows, Native, UTF-8 and DOS.
But the following encodings also work: ShiftJIS-Mac, ShiftJIS-Win, Korean-Mac, Korean-Win, Korean-Johab, ChineseTrad-Mac, ChineseTrad-Win, ChineseSimp-Mac, ChineseSimp-Win, Cyrillic-Mac, Cyrillic-Win, ISO-8859-5, CentralEurope-Mac, EasternEurope-Win, ISO-8859-2, Turkish-Mac, Turkish-Win, ISO-8859-3, ISO-8859-9, Baltic-Win, ISO-8859-4, Arabic-Mac, Arabic-Win, ISO-8859-6, Greek-Mac, Greek-Win, ISO-8859-7, Hebrew-Mac, Hebrew-Win, ISO-8859-8 or ISO-8859-15.
But what if you have a more exotic text encoding or an old DOS code page? Like CP865?
After the conference is before the conference.
We are looking forward to meet all the FileMaker developers next year in Nashville.
Claris International Inc. hosts the Claris Engage conference in Nashville, August 3-6 2020.
We will probably attend and have a booth as usual, so see you there!
Please join our MBS Plugin Presentation at 12:00 PM on Wednesday. It's lunch time, so get some food and sit down in the theater for an update on what is new in the MBS FileMaker Plugin:
Come by to our booth, read the posters, ask us questions and talk with us about existing and future features.
We got flyers with our DevCon2019 coupon code for the discount on licenses (20% on everything).
Nickenich, Germany (August 6th, 2019) -- Monkeybread Software releases new versions of their Xojo Kits, powerful add-ons to Xojo with additional functionality provided as source code.
All Kits have been updated to make sure they work in Xojo 2019.
If you have a current license, bought within the last 12 months, you can use the updates for free.
Otherwise you can order licenses on our websites or in the Xojo store as needed.
The webshop offers the iOS related kits in a discounted bundle named iOS Kit Set.
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Salman (Notarize apps for…): Thanks Christian I logged… Christian Schmitz… (Notarize apps for…): Login to Apple Website an… Salman (Notarize apps for…): I am trying to notarize m… Christian Schmitz… (How to use XL fun…): Please see example script… Maksym Petrusenko… (How to use XL fun…): how do i write format or … Markus Winter (NativePath vs. Ab…): Nice one! Thanks! Christian Schmitz… (Code Signing File…): No try needed and guess.
… David Sparrow (Code Signing File…): Dear Christian, I’m getti… Christian Schmitz… (Calendar access i…): Not much.
Seems it works… siglinde müller (Calendar access i…): any news o this?
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We recently had a client asking how to connect to Oracle database with MBS Xojo SQL Plugin. So first install Instant Client. For that download it, unzip the folder and put it somewhere you like to have it, e.g. in a C:\Oracle folder. Next you need to add the folder to the PATH variable, so you go to My Computer -> Properties -> Advanced -> Environment Variables -> PATH and add in the list as first item the path to the folder with the instant client libraries, e.g. C:\Oracle\instantclient_19_3.
Once again Xojo Inc. sponsors an episode of the 
Monkeybread Software today is proud to announce Combine PDFs 5.4, an update to their popular PDF merge and split tool for Mac OS. With a focus on ease-of-use, Combine PDFs is a lightweight utility which allows anyone to merge PDF files and images into a single PDF file. The user need only drag & drop files onto the program icon. The main window appears, allowing the user to set the order in which the files are joined. 
New in this prerelease of version 9.4 of the MBS FileMaker Plugin:
Looking for someone to hire?
Vom 16. bis 19. Oktober 2019 findet die zehnte deutschsprachige 
Nickenich, Germany (August 6th, 2019) -- Monkeybread Software releases new versions of their Xojo Kits, powerful add-ons to Xojo with additional functionality provided as source code.
