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Solution Oversight Services (SOS)

Over the years we've noticed that most FileMaker consultants focus their services on fixing your problems after they occur. Here at FDS we would rather help you prevent problems from arising in the first place by helping you make certain your database is properly designed and correct development procedures are followed from the outset. Let us save you time, aggravation and money with our Solution Oversight Services (SOS)...

Novice developed databases generally reach critical mass within six months to two years. Then they quietly implode. The novice discovers a problem he just can't fix, finds he cannot add a new feauture, or data suddenly and inexplicably disappears or becomes corrupted. Thinking he just needs a little help, a professional custom development house is brought in as a consultant. However, the response is quite often: "What you ask is not possible or practical with the current database. It is going to be quicker, cheaper and easier to redo the entire project from scratch."

Most people are shocked by this response and don't understand how this could be possible. They read the manual, subscribed to all the FMP mailing lists, got tips, demos, downloaded samples and starting templates, and in general did everything they could to get help along the way.

“All I wanted was a simple fix and a new feature! Why does my project need to be redone from the beginning?”

The reason many novice-developed FileMaker solutions eventually implode is very simple: They suffer from an inadequate, inappropriate or nonexistent design, and did not follow a strict development protocol.

Despite the fact that proper design and development procedures are without any doubt the most important aspects of database development, these concepts are not covered to any significant degree, if at all, in any FileMaker books or manuals, on any web sites or on any mailing lists. If you need help solving a technical problem... writing a calculation or debugging a script, the free resources available to you are vast and impressive. If you need to know how to properly design your database and what procedures to follow during development, you will find a wasteland: nothing of significance anywhere!

Proper database design and development procedures are not things that can simply be taught or learned from a book. These are skills that must be acquired through experience, because the correct design for a database is different for each set of circumstances. This is where FDS comes in...

We will be your project manager. We will guide you along the way, show you how to design your project and supervise the entire development process, just as if you were one of our progarmmers.

We will guide you through:

And provide you with:

What is the cost of this service? Perhaps nothing...

We realize the probability that you will need the services of a consultant at some point in your project are very, very high. In fact, if you follow the customary approach FileMaker novices invariably take, it is a virtual certainty. In the long run, your company will contract with an outside consultant for a number of hours that is roughly equivalent to about 10-20% of the hours it would have taken that consultant to do the entire project.

Nota Bene: Many novice developers don't realize that when they call in the services of a professional consultant, before being able to offer any kind of help or advice the consultant must reverse-engineer the project in order to understand it. This generally takes quite a few hours if the project is at all advanced and adds considerably to the consulting costs. If we have supervised the design of your system from the start, we already know how it works and won't need this reverse-engineering time. Therefore, you get a double benefit from using our SOS service: a better design and $0 spent on reverse engineering.

As money to pay a consultant for fixing problems along the way is going to be spent regardless, why not instead spend that money more wisely, making certain the project is properly planned and executed from the outset, and therefore never needs fixing. If you engage us at the beginning of your project for guidance with project planning and direction of the development process, you will end up with a database system that is properly designed and is far less likely to require consultant services later. In the process, you will learn how to do all the tasks related to building a database and may not need us at all for your next project.

The total amount you will spend on our SOS service should be roughly the same or less than you would have later spent on consultant services for problem solving, and therefore the net additional cost to you could well be zero!

You pay only for what you need, and can discontinue at any time. Our rates for SOS are the same as our regular programming/consulting rates. $100 per hour, with a minimum advance purchase of 20 hours. Depending on the size of your project, 20 hours should get you well through the document production phase, into the design phase and possibly into the actual coding phase where you will need us far less. Remember, once the design and basic structure of your database are in place, you can get much of the problem solving advice you need from a wide variety of free web sources (save your hours with us for when you really need them). By then you'll only need us for an hour or two a week to review and oversee your progress.

Don't set yourself up for frustration and disappointment. With just a little help and guidance you can build the solution you want and get it right the first time. Give us a call today.

Call us at 432-386-2121 or send us an email at: sos@foundationdbs.com