Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Filemaker Releases Bento 4, Updates iPhone and iPad Apps

MacRumors

MacRumors

macrumors bot
Original poster
Apr 12, 2001
68,701
39,620



093827-bento_4_banner.jpg

Apple subsidiary Filemaker today announced the release of Bento 4, a significant update to the company's personal database software for Mac OS X. With the release, Bento is now available on the Mac App Store for the first time, although boxed versions are also available.

New features in Bento 4 include support for label printing, new options for printing forms, the option to export templates with data included for pre-populated templates, location data integration, and more. Bento 4 is priced at $49 for a single license or $99 for a five-license pack. Current Bento users are eligible for a $20 rebate.

Filemaker has also released updated versions of Bento for iPhone and iPad, priced at $4.99 each. The updates bring several enhancements including voice memo support and multitasking.Bento for iPhone and Bento for iPad have both received significant updates. You can now record voice memos into media fields on your mobile devices and tie them to your records, perfect for capturing events, logging meetings for later review, and just capturing notes without typing. Voice memos can be synched with Bento 4 for the Mac.

Bento for Mac users can make more use of their information on the Bento for iPhone and Bento for iPad. Now you can sync iCal tasks from the Mac, edit simple list data on your iPhone, and use related records to link libraries.

Other enhancements include multi-tasking and improved support for the iPhone Retina display.The Bento iOS applications also now offer support for multiple languages for the first time, with Japanese, French, German, Italian, Spanish, and Dutch now being supported.

Article Link: Filemaker Releases Bento 4, Updates iPhone and iPad Apps
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2011/03/16/filemaker-releases-bento-4-updates-iphone-and-ipad-apps/
Wait im confused $49 single lisence and $99 for 5. but if you buy it from the app store aren't you suppose to be able to install it legally on any computer you authorize with that itunes account?
 
Does bento allow you to make your own databases or are you required to follow templates?

My wife is looking for some apps for teaching. She needs something to build her grades/gradebook and class planning. She also needs an app to organize her private lessons separately (she's a music teacher). She has a MacBook pro, but also has an iPod Touch and about to get my iPad, so we'd like something that integrates between the iPad/iPod and the MacBook. Most of the gradebook and planner apps are too rigid and will not work with the systems at her school and not integrate between desktop and iDevice.

Can I build something very flexible in Bento and transport the data back and forth between the desktop and iPad versions?
 
I tried a couple releases of Bento and just didn't see what was so great about it.
 
Teacher? Bento as a grade book? Nope

I'm a teacher, and I thought Bento would be fantastic as a Grade book. Not so. Yes it can keep track of grades, but I have not found a way to make dynamic equations to figure out student and class averages using Bento. Just not powerful enough. For a great Grade book, recommend pages (tables can use equations) or numbers.

Cheers
 
If I wanted to sync it on my Mac, iPad and iPhone, I'd have to buy a copy for each one? Not that's it's a tremendous financial burden at $5 each for the latter two.
 
Didn't use Bento 3 much until I got the iPad app. I found the iPad app was great in collecting data on the go ... like when I organized a large party and could keep track of who paid for what as we went along buying flowers, cake etc. I just carried the iPad along with me entering the data. Looks like now I can get a summation of costs with the new simple list. The iPad would sync over a local network so I could do more advanced work on my MBP. The lack of labels has been a major complaint for Bento 3 which looks like now has been addressed. The new location field requires a network connection ... would be great if it used the iPad's gps for on the go data collecting.
 
Bento, is as a stand-alone limited database for the non-technical, definitely better than MS Access. But on the other hand the uses for a non-techical database are mostly limited to things like 'my wine collection'.
I don't know much about the professional variant Filemaker, but if you could integrate Bento with a more professional, more widespread db,
it could certainly be more appealing for very small businesses and self-employed people.
 
Last edited:
Bento isn't a database

Just from my POV, Bento is not a database as we all understand it. It's a fancy spreadsheet. I mean that lovingly, but if you really want to know the difference between Bento and complex db's, it's that you basically get 2 dimensions. It's a very easy thing, and you can do some fancy looking forms, but the data behind it is always one table.

If you need to use more than one table at the same time, you need something more robust. If you need to track relatively simple things, aka no "dependencies", this is perfect.

I hope that helps someone.
 
I moved from Filemaker 7 Pro to Bento 3 hoping I could get largely the same features for less money. I was wrong and Bento 4 doesn't look to change that (whooo, I can print labels...).

I'm probably moving back to Filemaker now since I have to pay to continue to (hope they) upgrade Bento (with useful features).

Simple way to decide between Filemaker and Bento.

Do you know what a database is? Filemaker
Do you really want to organize your wine collection? Delicious Library
Are you managing a soccer team? Numbers

Wait, I left out Bento...

Are you managing a soccer team using an iPad? Numbers

Nuts, did it again...

Are you managing a soccer team and don't know what a spreadsheet is? Bento
 
Zoiks said:
I'm a teacher, and I thought Bento would be fantastic as a Grade book. Not so. Yes it can keep track of grades, but I have not found a way to make dynamic equations to figure out student and class averages using Bento. Just not powerful enough. For a great Grade book, recommend pages (tables can use equations) or numbers.

Cheers
Click to expand...

Thanks for the input, especially coming from another teacher! Numbers was a possibility, I was less enthusiastic as an option only because I didn't like the platform tie in that Numbers as a spreadsheet application made. I suspose though, if I was willing to buy bento for both platforms for this purpose, numbers is a cheaper solution.
 
Is Bento useful if you just want to keep track of personal networking information? My girlfriend is an actor and she would like to keep track of people she auditions for and who she works with (so she might have multiple entries of auditions for a specific casting director). She can use Excel (a bit), but maybe the graphical nature of Bento is better. For example, everyone in her business has person websites, so she can pull down a picture and put it in the Bento file easily. Can you do much in the way of organizing with your Bento files? Like could she pull up all "Casting Directors" and print out an address label for them if she wanted to do a mass mailing?

Any suggestions on something better than Bento?

Incidentally, I did look at the Bento's video demo. It is kind of disturbing that the overview takes only 3 minutes and the other video demonstrations on specific sections pretty much just cover the same ground as the overview. The program doesn't look very powerful. But it also might be plenty for personal needs.

http://www.filemaker.com/products/bento/demos/?homepage=bento_box_demo#started
 
Last edited by a moderator:
frunkis54 said:
Wait im confused $49 single lisence and $99 for 5. but if you buy it from the app store aren't you suppose to be able to install it legally on any computer you authorize with that itunes account?
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is a good time to buy apps from the Mac app store. They (Apple) haven't quite figured it all out, yet.
 
Now that we have cameras on the iPad, it's high time to incorporate Barcode/QR Code reading into Filemaker Go. It would save a lot of layout building and awkward typing when using my iPad for inventory.
 
TallManNY said:
Is Bento useful if you just want to keep track of personal networking information? My girlfriend is an actor and she would like to keep track of people she auditions for and who she works with (so she might have multiple entries of auditions for a specific casting director). She can use Excel (a bit), but maybe the graphical nature of Bento is better. For example, everyone in her business has person websites, so she can pull down a picture and put it in the Bento file easily. Can you do much in the way of organizing with your Bento files? Like could she pull up all "Casting Directors" and print out an address label for them if she wanted to do a mass mailing?

Any suggestions on something better than Bento?
Click to expand...

Bento relies heavily on services already provided by the OS but in such a way that it doesn't really integrate with them. Yeah, confusing I know. Essentially it can pull entries from iCal or Address Book and use them in a Bento database (which is separate from iCal and Address Book). What you put in Bento stays in Bento unless you export it as a csv file to use in a spreadsheet or whatnot.

Essentially, I'd try to use Address Book book for your needs. It comes with the OS and it allows for groups and mass mailings already (if you use the mail app and not a web app). Heck, Address Book can even print out labels/stickers like Bento 4.

I wouldn't be surprised if Bento started it's life as a potential iWork suite app (Apple/ClarusWorks had a database app) until they realized that Numbers largely did the same thing. It then was relegated to attempting fill in iMovie is to Final Cut Pro as ______ is to Filemaker but they forgot to make Bento have unique and useful features (iMovie is actually useful for certain tasks). Unfortunately, the unique features are not useful and the useful features are available in applications that ship with every mac (eg Address Book, iCal) or are cheaper (eg Numbers).
 
TallManNY, Bento will do what your girlfriend wants as a basic database of contacts. I did the same last year, but "in reverse" as a stage director recording photo, contact details and comments for all the actors that auditioned and were subsequently cast. It wasn't difficult to set up (compared to, say, using Filemaker) and looked quite impressive (compared to using a simple spreadsheet in Excel). But that is just about the limit of Bento's functionality. Certainly it is next to useless for anything more than basic calculations.
 
Thanks for the responses. It does seem enough for girlfriend's purposes but it also seems unclear if it can do enough more than the Address Book to make it worthwhile. There is a downloadable demo, so we will check it out. Thanks for the tips.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back