00:00 - Intro 01:00 - Our guest today: Dave Ramsey, developer of FM Perception 01:28 - What is FM Perception? What are Database Design Reports (DDR)? What were the precursors to FM Perception (fmXRaySpecs)? 08:30 - Dave discusses some of the other environments, languagues and tools that he uses in his development (AppleScript, Swift, .NET, etc.). 11:10 - "It was kind of a, 'Hey, I wonder if I can do this,' and unfortunately that's been the start of a lot of the weird projects that I've done." 11:25 - How long did it take to develop FM Perception? 12:30 - "I didn't set out trying to make a DDR tool, I set out trying to learn a little bit more about the way XML parsing works...and ended up with a DDR tool because there was no other choice." 13:20 - When did you realize that this was a marketable product? 15:30 - Nick talks about how he uses FM perception and how the program has become best-practice at Adatasol. 19:05 - "[FM Perception] just removes all the head-wind, any pressure that tries to say, 'I don't really want to run another DDR and do another analysis,'—it's trivial." 20:58 - FileMaker and XML: a look toward the future of FM Perception 24:35 - "The ability to slice up the XML,...manipulate the XML and do something with that XML—there's no end...We can just keep doing neater and neater stuff pretty much forever." 25:09 - The benefits, theoretically speaking, of bidirectional XML in FileMaker. 26:33 - FileMaker 17 - the potential of new "Add-On" features 29:22 - Indirection, Script Triggers, and other dangers of creative liberty. Has FM Perception emboldened developers to use these tools haphazardly? 35:48 - Feature Highlight: Text Search - you can perform a free-form text search across the entirety of your DDR and then search among the results. 38:44 - Feature Highlight: Flagged Functions (Preferences) - add additional calculation functions to look for in the DDR and flag it. 43:04 - FM Perception and Geist Interactive at DevCon 2018
Dave Ramsey, developer of FMPerception, your hosts' favorite DDR analysis tool, joins the podcast. Dave discusses the history of Database Design Reports (DDR) and the various precursors to his product, FMPerception, including fmXRaySpecs and several native FileMaker solutions. He talks about developing in AppleScript, Swift, .NET, among other environments, and how a general curiosity and desire to learn led him quite fortuitously to developing FMPerception. Dave shares a few pro tips for using FMPerception, including the Text Search and Flagged Functions features. Finally, Dave explains some possibilities for the future, including bidirectional XML and third-party Add-Ons.