Home > Designing and creating databases > Creating scripts to automate tasks > Using buttons with scripts > Defining a button

Defining a button

To define a button:

1.	If you're defining a button that performs a script (as opposed to a single FileMaker Pro command), create the script.

See Creating and editing scripts.

2.	In Layout mode, choose the layout where you want to locate the button from the Layout pop-up menu.

3.	Create or select the object that will serve as the button on the layout in one of two ways, as follows.

 

To	Do this
Create a new button	In the status toolbar, do the following.  • Windows: Click the arrow next to the Button tool or the Popover Button tool , and choose Button from the menu, then drag the crosshair to draw the button.  • OS X: Click and hold the Button tool or the Popover Button tool , and choose Button from the menu, then drag the crosshair to draw the button. Tip  You can also choose Insert menu > Button.
Attach a button definition to existing object(s), like text or a field	Select the object(s) and choose Format menu > Button Setup. If you select multiple objects, FileMaker Pro groups them when you define them as a button. See Grouping and ungrouping objects.

4.	In the Button Setup dialog box, select a command from the list and, if necessary, set options for the command.

5.	If you want the button to perform an entire script, select Perform Script and choose a script. (You can only select one script per button.)

6.	If you created a new button, type a label for the button at the insertion point.

7.	To change appearance of the button, see Setting the fill, line style, and borders for objects, layout parts, and the layout background.

8.

Click OK.

9.	Switch to Browse mode or Find mode to use the button.

Notes

•	To see buttons on a layout, choose View menu > Show > Buttons.

•

If a button references a script or script step, a button badge appears in the lower right corner of the button. If the button has other FileMaker Pro badges associated with it, the button badge could be obscured by the other badges and therefore not be visible. For more information about badges, see Identifying badges on layout objects.

•	To change button text, click the Text tool in the status toolbar.

•	In the Button Setup dialog box, you can:

•	choose whether the pointer will change to a hand cursor when it is over the button.

•	choose items in the Show Compatibility list to see which script steps are available in FileMaker Pro (Macintosh or Windows), FileMaker Go (iOS), Custom Web Publishing, or FileMaker WebDirect.

•	Perform Script is useful if you want to run subscripts. You can choose options to Pause, Resume, Exit, or Halt any script that is currently running. Here is a general description of what happens to the currently running script when a user clicks the button:

•	Pause (the default): a paused script remains paused.

•	Resume: a paused script will be resumed after the button’s script executes.

•	Exit: a current paused script is exited. If the current script was called by another script, control returns to the original script.

•	Halt: execution of all scripts (except the button’s script) is halted.

•	Another type of button that you can create is a popover button, which displays a popover. See Working with popovers on layouts.

Related topics 

Script steps reference (category list)

Script steps reference (alphabetical list)