FileMaker and PDF Containers

There are sometimes problems with Containers as you see in various FileMaker forums. Well, the problem may be that FileMaker can do only previews on Mac as they don't include a PDF engine for Windows. So if you try and add files and check with Container.GetTypes what items are in the container, you get a table like this:

FileMaker 16 Win
Any Container	Insert File	FILE, FNAM
Any Container	Insert Picture	FNAM, PDF
Interactive Container	Insert PDF	FNAM, PDF
After using DynaPDF.GeneratePreview		FNAM, JPEG, MAIN, PDF , SIZE
FileMaker 16 Mac
Any Container	Insert File	FILE, FNAM
Any Container	Insert Picture	FNAM, JPEG, MAIN, PDF , PNGf, SIZE
Interactive Container	Insert PDF	FNAM, JPEG, MAIN, PDF , PNGf, SIZE
After using PDFKit.Combine function		FNAM, JPEG, MAIN, PDF , SIZE

We have a couple of common types in the containers:

"PDF " is the PDF file data.
FILE is the content of a file.
JPEG if exists is the JPEG preview data.
PNGf if exists is a preview as PNG image file.
FNAM is the file name for the container.
SIZE is the preview image size.

Now you need to know that FileMaker can render PDF on Mac on the fly (without annotations!), but on Windows it needs the preview. Or for all platforms use a web viewer for the interactive container to let the web engine render the PDF using it's PDF plugin.

You can of course always use MBS functions to check if preview is missing and add it on the fly using both PDFKit and DynaPDF functions. This could even be done on a server with a scheduled script or on a helper machine. The MBS Plugin adds a JPEG preview and you can use Plugin.SetPreviewSize function to configure preview size. Claris FileMaker Plugin