Kool Aid

Surely abandoning the detrimental Macintosh platform would miraculously resolve this problem. Let's join in the Microsoft Mantra: Hare Gates, hare Gates, hare hare. Hare Gates, hare Gates, hare Billy, hare Gates. Hare Billy, hare Billy, hare hare, hare Gates!

I have reasons to believe that they've finally realised that the problem is beyond their expertise.

Here's the answer: You can't have live database links between VW and FMP. You can, however, transfer data between the two applications, but this requires both effort & discipline by the user and programming at both ends. It is not just simply an operating system issue, as the resident Orc would like us to believe. In addition, there's even an argument for data transfer vs. live linking. This is accentuated in complex relational database schemas, eg. costings, when unit costs may or may not be varied by the project and by item. As far as I'm concerned, there's no personal argument here, despite the fact that I do get annoyed by the ignorance of the simpleton ignoramus.

Indeed. ODBC would do exactly that. In fact, that would enable VW to communicate with something like MySQL on Linux, too. Did anyone know that Microsoft Access has no sales at all? No-one buys it. (Ohh ? it does come with MS Office for Windows, but so do 12 steak knives with a genuine timber chopping board.)

Dear me, dear me! ODBC has been a part of the Mac OS since year Sword and Shield. The Benelux distributor of VW created a platform-independent ODBC-interface only a year or two later. Your paranoia is of course amusing to the extreme, but the fact is that there has not been (perceived) commercial demand for this functionality. I'm not at liberty to quote the comments by (then) Diehl Graphsoft senior staff. This has nothing to do with your Windows/Macintosh war.

Which part of "OLE DB" link did you not understand? Ohh, I understand all of it. But what parts of "ANY" and "EVERY" are beyond your comprehension, dearest deputy leader of toilet-cleaning-duty Uruk-hai? Let me guess: AppleScript was supported before we Mac-users paid for the development of the Windows-version.

No easy way, but with named objects in VW, your FMP database can populate/amend VW records with an FMP script, utilising AppleScript as the pipeline. EDIT Well, actually it IS easy, considering the complexity of the operation. However, in this case there is something in a name, so it's not for aspiring Romeos.

No: to educate you. And, boy, are you in need of that! Yes, OLE could be used to do some stuff with some databases, but not everything with anything. I would indeed love to offer a revised system to an old client of mine, in which I interface Oracle Spatialware and MapInfo via intelligent, managed alphanumeric and MID/MIF exports & imports. Sorry: your OLE does not bring MapInfo, Oracle, FileMaker Pro etc. tables into VW; ODBC does. But of course you don't want anything that would not be fully controlled by your master, Sauron himself. I wonder if there are Spatial Information Systems 101 -classes at a Workingman's Institute near you.

Ol? the ignorance of the ignorami! OLE would not help at all. ODBC would ? and fancy that: the wholly-owned subsidiary of Apple, FileMaker Inc, offers a fine relational database system with ODBC.