Of course, you can use other methods of generating a number UUID, including Custom Functions and Plugins. This makes a big difference as your table grows. Number fields, on the other hand, are handled differently than Text fields, including how they are indexed. This can get expensive in terms of maintaining a larger index and can have implications for scaling. If you use a UUID for Primary Keys as well as the Get (UUID) function, your keys are all text. Instead, use the new Get (UUIDNumber) function, and define the field as a Number if you need a Primary Key field. If you do that, you will likely experience a namespace collision, since the value may not be unique when only its numbers are considered. You can see this by using the GetAsNumber function on any string. “But,” you say, “I can put letters in a number field and they work.” Yes, you can, but using them as keys to relate to other values effectively strips the letters, leaving only numbers in the index. This new function generates a 30-byte value, opposed to a 72-byte value for the text UUID. This makes it suitable to use as a Primary Key defined as a Number field. Get (UUIDNumber) is also designed to generate a universally unique value but without including any letters. It therefore must be saved as a Text type of field and indexed as text.

The FileMaker function Get (UUID) will generate a text string containing numbers and letters.

There are several different methods used to generate a UUID. Your keys will, theoretically, never duplicate, and you can avoid collisions. However, using a UUID takes advantage of easier syncing and importing from multiple users. You might be used to using a serial number for a Primary Key, which is valid. (You DO use Primary Keys, right?) Using a UUID as a Primary Key in and of itself is not bad design, however there are considerations to be made. We all use Primary Keys in our tables to create relationships. Because they are intended to be unique, you can use one as a Primary Key in database design. These are also known as a Globally Unique Identifiers. It follows an internet standard for generating a string value designed to be unique across space and time. In version 12, FileMaker introduced a function for generating a Universally Unique IDentifier, or UUID.

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