FileMakerSQL, Graphing, and Forecasting
GREG LANE OF SKELETON KEY explores using ExecuteSQL to produce more effective charts–which is what our clients want, isn’t it? This is part one of three:
Sometimes as software developers we get caught up in the details of collecting, storing, and displaying data. To our clients, this is rarely the ultimate goal. Our clients want to use data to make better decisions that will increase profits, utilize resources more efficiently, and improve lives.
This is part one of a series of articles exploring techniques for getting more out of your data. In this series, we’ll show you how to implement a variety of practical forecasting models in FileMaker Pro. A few of the topics we have planned include:
- Moving averages
- Weighted averages
- Exponential smoothing
- Trend projections
- Seasonal trend projections
While there are a variety of ways to implement these kinds of algorithms, we’re going to focus on using methods that are easy to understand and implement. We’ll be using FileMaker 12’s ExecuteSQL function extensively because it’s ideal for computing sums and averages from sets of data. Later in the series, we’ll explore ways to optimize performance when working with larger sets of data.
(Note: This is a modified re-post. The original was posted in 2013)