The modularfilemaker.org module, HyperList, is one of the best examples of what can happen when you get a community involved in developing solutions to common problems.  HyperList v2 gains support for gathering multiple fields and it can optionally detect and use the new FileMaker 13 only ListOf Summary Field. It provides a single common method for all your list gathering needs.

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Gathering Filemaker Records

Gathering record IDs across a found set comes in handy in a couple of different scenarios. It’s useful if you want to save and restore found sets and if you want to build FileMaker virtual lists.  MasterDetail, another mFM module, uses HyperList to gather record IDs.

Multiple Fields

Sometimes you want to gather the data from more than one field into your virtual list.  This technique may take a bit longer to gather the data. But it makes up for the speed lost while gathering by getting rid of the requirement to pull in data through un-stored relationships. Thanks to Jason Young of SeedCode, HyperList 2 can now handle up to 5 fields at a time.

FileMaker 13 ListOf Summary Field

FileMaker 13 added a new type of summary field called “List Of“. This field makes it easy to gather Filemaker record IDs by summarizing a record ID field.  HyperList can now detect if it has been given such a field and skip over it’s looping steps and just use the field as is.

You may ask why bother with HyperList if at all if ListOf can do it faster?  ListOf is FileMaker 13 only, and does require adding a new field for each ID you want to gather.  HyperList works in FM 11 and FM 12 and it doesn’t require adding any additional fields.  HyperList is more modular and is still pretty damn fast.  If you encounter scenarios where you need the extra speed that ListOf provides, you can easily swap over and use it instead without having to go back and rewrite other code.

Graph

Here is a graph showing how HyperList performs in various configurations over various found sets.

HyperList Gathering FileMaker records

Download

HyperList is available for download over at modularfilemaker.org