FM Data Migration Tool

The all new FileMaker 17 is available today.

There is a lot new in the next version of the multi platform software. It has a robust database engine integrated with data presentation tools. It allows to develop and deliver state of the art custom apps fast. And now we have the most important feature of the new release introduced here: the Data Mover.

This blog entry is thought for experienced developers on the FileMaker platform. They know that most apps never are all finished. So what happens when they need to roll out an update even to only one production environment? Up till today there were only two basic scenarios: either they developed on a backup of the production system and when time to update came, a copy of the development was taken and all data from the production copy imported into the ‚new‘ production version. Cumbersome, time consuming, error prone process. The alternative was working on the running system – and though FileMaker has always been very forgiving, this was a dangerous thing to do. Changing schema in a running system might exclude users from working. Saving schema changes was sometimes delayed due to user processes. And experimenting and try-and-error approaches, as seen many times, are disturbing, error-prone and thus dangerous to data (and customers’ businesses.)

Finally FileMaker has addressed the situation with a tool that makes it both fast and easy to move a solution to a new version. Lets take a closer look.

The tool is operated from the command line, most certainly on the machine that hosts the current data and production version. It runs fast, really fast. Large data migrations are a matter of seconds or minutes, where the process of scripted data migration (import into tables) would have taken a multitude of that time.

The tool will be available to registered FileMaker developers (Community membership) the same way as the Developers kit for iOS stand alone apps.

Stay tuned for more to come on the FMDMtool soon (after my presentation at dotFMP18 in Berlin next month).