Here, at the End of All Things

Let me start by saying: “Ouch.” It has been far, far, far too long since our last article. Someone much wiser than me once said something like this: “My only comfort is that I tried. My only regret is that I failed.” I’ll leave it at that.

In short order, I’ll be posting our first new article in over 18 months. But first I thought I’d share a little news. For those who are here for great FileMaker info, feel free to skip ahead. (And let’s be honest, that’s the only reason *any* of you are here.)

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By Popular Demand

Many of you may not know that in order to be accepted as a speaker at the FileMaker Developers Conference, you have to submit a “speaker demo,” which is a short self-made video of yourself presenting some topic.

I had to do this for the first time last year, and my demo video was a bit of a hit among my Phoenix FileMaker friends. I wasn’t accepted as a speaker in 2007, so maybe the powers that be didn’t think I had exactly the right idea.

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FileMaker Pro 9: The Missing Manual Now Available

We’re thrilled to let you know that FileMaker Pro 9: The Missing Manual is now available for sale. This sequel to the best selling FileMaker book out there was written by yours truly (Six Fried Rice co-owner Geoff Coffey), and the amazing Susan Prosser. You can read more about it [here](http://sixfriedrice.com/wp/products/filemaker-pro-missing-manual/) where you can also find a free sample chapter.

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Six Fried Rice at the DevCon FileMaker Genius Bar

I’m excited to let you all know that Jesse and I will be participating in a cool new dealio at DevCon. If you haven’t heard about it, here’s the scoop: Chris Kubica ([author](http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/102-8153790-3308927?%5Fencoding=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=books&field-author=Chris%20Kubica), [developer](http://www.applicationarch.com/), and all around FileMaker powerhouse), arranged for a special booth at DevCon to be staffed by reasonably good FileMaker folks like us. You can bring your problems, questions, and FileMaker challenges to the booth and get free advice. It’s called the FileMaker Genius Bar. I love the idea and hate the name.

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Announcing the Ruby API for FileMaker

We just rolled out 1.0 of Rfm It’s an awesome object-oriented API for Ruby. With it, you can talk to FileMaker server.

In the past you had to have FileMaker Server Advanced to do anything like this, but with today’s announcement of FileMaker Server 9, that is no longer the case. Now the regular $999 server has full XML publishing capabilities. This is huge.

So if you use Ruby or Ruby on Rails, or you’ve always wondered what it’s all about, have a peek.

Click here to find out more about Rfm

Announcing FREE FileMaker to JSON Converter

If you do any so-called AJAX development, you may be familiar with [JSON][1]. This terse “object notation” lets you turn just about any set of data into a compact plain-text string that can easlily be shuttled across the network or from one program to another. Most AJAX libraries have built in support for JSON. We’ve just posted the [FileMaker to JSON Converter][2], an XSLT template that adds direct-to-JSON support to FileMaker Server Advanced. With this little beauty installed, dynamic web applications, ruby scripts, dashboard widgets, and gadgets can talk direclty to FileMaker with ease.

[1]:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Json
[2]:http://www.sixfriedrice.com/wp/products/filemaker-to-json-converter/

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