User manual

Chapter 6
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Converting FileMaker databases from previous versions 107
Top conversion issues
The following sections briefly describe the top issues that you may
encounter when converting FileMaker Pro databases earlier than 7.0
to FileMaker Pro
8. For complete details, see Converting FileMaker
Databases from Previous Versions
on www.filemaker.com/
downloads.
Passwords
During conversion, passwords are converted into accounts in
FileMaker Pro 8. There are two common password conversion issues:
1 For each converted account, both the account name and the
password in the converted file are initially set to the password from
the original file, which makes all passwords visible to anyone who has
Full Access privileges. For security reasons, you should either change
each account name so that it no longer matches its password, or
change each password so that it no longer matches its account name.
(You could also set an option for each account to require a password
change by the user upon the next login.)
1 Passwords in FileMaker Pro 8 are case-sensitive. Make sure you
enter your password exactly as it was created in a previous version of
FileMaker Pro. For more information, see
“The converted file won’t
accept my password” in the previous section.
Preserving user dictionary information
During conversion, the reference to a user dictionary is handled
differently depending on whether you are using the default user
dictionary or a custom user dictionary.
1 Default user dictionary: When you convert a database file that
uses the default user dictionary (user.upr), the converted file points to
the user.upr file in the new FileMaker Pro 8 folder. Therefore, you
should copy the user.upr file from the previous FileMaker Pro
application folder to the FileMaker Pro 8 folder, or export information
from the user.upr file to the FileMaker Pro 8 user.upr file before using
the converted database.
1 Custom user dictionary: When you convert a database file that
references a custom dictionary file, the converted file continues to
look for the dictionary in its previous location. If you move or delete
the dictionary from that location, the converted file will no longer
have access to information in the custom dictionary. This could
happen accidentally if the original custom dictionary file is located in
the previous FileMaker Pro folder and you later uninstall the previous
version of FileMaker Pro.
To preserve a custom user dictionary, move the dictionary file to your
My Documents folder (Windows) or you home folder (Mac
OS).
Then, after converting a database file, specify that it use the dictionary
file in the new location. For more information, see the information on
selecting spelling dictionaries in Help.
Print Setup script step stored setup options (Windows)
The Print Setup script step is able to store and use custom paper
options that can be recalled when you run a script. This allows you to
use a script to print a particular layout with different paper options —
for example, to print labels or print on a pre-printed form.
The FileMaker Pro format to create and store options in the Print
Setup script step is not compatible with the format used in pre-7.0
versions of FileMaker Pro, and FileMaker Pro 8 cannot completely
convert stored setup options in previous files to the new format.
After conversion, if you want to edit stored setup options for the Print
Setup script step, you may need to remember what the settings were
so that you can enter them again properly. You may want to view the
options in the previous, unconverted file so that you can enter them
correctly.