Quick Start

Lesson 3
Finding and sorting records
Your database is a collection of records. Sometimes you’ll work with all
of the records in the database (to mail out an annual catalog for each
customer record in the database, for example). Often, however, you’ll
work with a subset of your database—people who come from a particular
city, for example, or records that fall within a particular range of dates.
In FileMaker Pro, this process of searching for records that match
particular criteria is called finding records. Once you’ve found the
records you want to work with, you can change their order by sorting
them. Records can be sorted in ascending or descending order.
In this lesson, you will:
1 find records matching criteria in a single field and multiple fields
1 find records matching a range of data
1 narrow your searches by omitting records
1 sort records in ascending and descending order
Note You can install a fresh copy of the tutorial files at any time. For
Windows-based systems, see “Compact installation or Custom
installation” on page 9. For Mac OS systems, see “Custom
installation” on page 20.
Find records based on criteria in a single field
In the membership database, find all of the members that are from
New York City.
1. Open the Tutorial folder in the FileMaker Pro folder.
2. Open the Sample Files folder.
You should be here: FileMaker Pro\Tutorial\Sample Files.
3. Open Sample03.fp5.
4. Choose View menu > Find Mode.
In Find mode, you create a find request using the fields in the layout
you see. Type the criteria you want to search for directly into the
fields on the request.
5. Type New York in the City field.
6. Click the Find button in the status area.
Your find request returns records for four members who live in New
York. This is the found set.
7. Click the book icon to view each of the four records in the found set.
Find
button
Total number of records in the database
Number of records in the found set