Filemaker

[Jammersix]

Are there any Filemaker fans here?

I've been coasting along, recording my ammo consumption project in a spreadsheet. (I know, gag, but it got the first couple of simple scenario reports displayed...)

So far, it's worked. But I finally stumbled outside the bounds of what a spreadsheet can do easily, and some attributes that were supposed to be simple attributes suddenly exploded into multi-line nightmare entries, with common spreadsheet results. No standardization for entry, more than one data type per attribute, all the standard spreadsheet nightmares. It's starting to look like an accounting spreadsheet designed by a real estate agent who needed to use it for baking recipes and was baking bread in a broken oven and watching porn while designing the spreadsheet.

I'm thinking of breaking down and building a data model, then implementing it in Filemaker. With Filemaker, there's always a considerable gap between the model and the product, but that gap makes me happy, because it makes the DBM so much easier to work with.

"In theory, there is no difference between theory and reality, in reality, there's a huge difference."

Except for light weapons, most ammo types are specific to a vehicle, Bradleys do not use 120mm APFSDS. No one but a tank does. So right off the bat, I'm arguing with myself about whether ammo is an attribute or an entity, and I haven't even really started.

There are a number of many-to-manys here, with 7.62 being used in everything from different machine guns to sniper rifles, and 5.56 being everywhere that doesn't have a main gun.

Edited July 28, 2016 by Jammersix

[Jammersix]

You guys are no help at all.

I should have known. Not a grunt in the bunch.

[A Canadian Cat]

Lol. Pretty much. Sorry I have no experience with filemaker.

When I do something like this I use MySQL or derby and create a Java front end. That gets the data in then I would use an off the self database explorer and writ SQL queries to explore the data. 

Or use mssql express for the database and write a C# front end.

As for the database design I'm not super experienced. I have several experts that I discuss ideas with. In my professional life dedicated people design the database. But I have done a couple of simple db designs. My thoughts on this would be to create an ammo usage table that had colums for all the ammo types. Then create a unit type table that tells you which ammo is used by that unit type. Then when you create a data usage entry you can link to the ammo carry table with the ammo usage entry. 

That actually would not be great for exploring the data with a generic query writer since you would need to write a separate query for each unit type to avoid a lot of uninteresting zeros. But that is still possible.

Anyway those are my thoughts for what they are worth.