Stay. Build beside it. Leave slowly, if ever.
That's what an All-Weather System does. You decide what happens to your system, and when. Your FileMaker keeps the real records, and everything built beside it is yours outright. Building in and out of FileMaker since 1990.
Prefer email? rene@filemakercoder.com
I reply personally within one business day or less.
Which one sounds like you?
It runs your business. You want to decide what's next.
The platform's direction gets decided somewhere else. Your system's direction should be decided by you. I lay out your real options, with prices, and you set the pace: stay, build beside it, or leave slowly.
Get an honest second opinion →
Your developer moved on. The system didn't.
I pick up where they left off, with no documentation needed to start. The first thing you get is a written map of what you have, in your name. From there, you decide what happens next.
How the handoff works →
You took over a system you didn't build.
You don't need to learn FileMaker to run the business. You need to know what the system does, what's worth keeping, and how to ask it questions in plain English. That's where I start.
Where to start →
Not sure which one? Take the two-minute self-check →
Whichever it is, you have six or seven figures' worth of work in that system: how you quote, bill, schedule and track. That's an asset. Treat it like one: know what you have, decide what's next, and set the schedule yourself.
Three ways to put the decisions back in your hands
Stay, build beside it, or leave slowly — each one is an All-Weather System, shaped to where your business is right now. You pick the path, and you can change it later.
Stewardship
I look after your FileMaker system — maintenance, fixes, moves to new hosting and new macOS or Windows versions, small changes — on a monthly retainer. You get a developer who answers. Every month you get a short written report: what changed, what I touched, what to watch next. It's filed inside your own FileMaker system, next to a running list of every account, license and renewal the system depends on, and a copy lands in your inbox. Anyone you hire later starts from there. The retainer also keeps a daily brief and up to two live boards running for you, puts one-click problem reports on your Macs, and warns you 30 days before anything on that list expires.
Extensions
Keep the FileMaker system your business already trusts. Add a modern, fast web application next to it: fleet management, customer portals, field data entry, purchasing, loss-and-damage tracking, payment processing. Your staff keeps the tool they know; your customers and field crews get something built this decade. Not sure it'll work for your system? I build a working prototype against your real FileMaker data before you commit to the full project.
Staged migration
When it makes sense to own everything outright — your data, your logic, no per-user license fees deciding your budget — I move the system in stages. The business keeps running on FileMaker while each piece proves itself on the new platform. No shutdown, no "we'll be down for a week." You stay on FileMaker if it serves the business, and you have a way out if that changes.
Beside FileMaker, I build with common web tools, not another vendor's platform
When your FileMaker system needs to reach further, I don't move you onto another vendor's platform. I build with common, widely used pieces that you own: Cloudflare to run things on the web, Postgres for data that outgrows FileMaker, and plain web pages for the screens. Not Ninox, not Salesforce, not Airtable — nothing that charges per user and makes your data hard to take with you. If you ever leave, you leave with everything.
See what's under the hood — every piece, and what you own →
Never dependent on one person — including me
Everything I build beside FileMaker runs on open, widely used technology: Postgres, JavaScript, Python, Cloudflare. Any competent web developer can pick it up, and that's a large and growing pool of people who work with AI tools every day.
Every engagement leaves documentation in your name: what the system does, where it runs, how to get in. Code, hosting and passwords live in your accounts, not mine.
Your system's future shouldn't hang on any one developer's plans. Mine included.
Why my advice reads differently
Most FileMaker consultancies work only in FileMaker. Their whole business depends on clients staying on the platform, so "stay" is the answer they can afford to give. They're not being dishonest. Their answer just comes out the same regardless of your situation.
I work both in and out of FileMaker. When I tell you your system is fine and here's the five-year plan, it isn't the only answer I could have given. That's what makes it worth taking.
Start with a free triage call
Thirty minutes. You describe the situation; I tell you what I'd look at, what the realistic options are, and whether a full assessment is worth doing. If you don't need me yet, I'll tell you.
When it goes deeper: the System Assessment — $250 or $500, about a week, ending in a written map of your system, yours to keep, with your realistic choices laid out. If you want to go further, a quote with good, better and best options follows, so the next decision is yours. Use it with me or with anyone else.
Thirty minutes on the phone, and you'll know what's solid and what isn't.
What you get is a straight answer about where things stand and your realistic options. No slide deck, and no string of follow-up emails afterward.
or call 760-889-9299
Prefer email? rene@filemakercoder.com
I reply personally within one business day or less.
What clients say
Rene is consistently available on short notice to troubleshoot, solve problems, and adapt our FileMaker system as our needs evolve. He's intelligent, communicates clearly, and always delivers on time.
Brett Carleton · Owner, grip and electric rental house, Los Angeles · client for over seven years
Rene took the time to understand why our processes worked the way they did, asked the right questions, and while building the replacement system, he simultaneously mitigated the highest priority issues in our existing setup. … I'd highly recommend Rene for any project requiring someone who can untangle complex systems and deliver reliable results.
Amy Cutter · Operations Manager, legal services firm
I needed a custom database to organize hundreds of documentary film interview transcripts and dramatically speed up the editing process. My own attempts using FileMaker Pro had stalled, but Rene not only understood my requirements—he delivered a product that was even better than I imagined.
Sally Nellson · Director and Executive Producer, NE♥PS
René is a delight to work with. Knowledgeable, highly competent, efficient, tolerant, patient, and reliable. A craftsman, and a pleasure to work with.
James Carroll · Founder and CEO, THOR Photomedicine
Just looked at the fleet board. This looks perfect.
Operations lead · grip and electric rental house, Los Angeles
Recent work
Industrial manufacturing
80 years of index cards, now on iPads.
An industrial electric-motor shop had tracked every job on 4×5 cards since the 1940s. The card system worked because the discipline around it was absolute — but it couldn't hold measurement histories or photograph what a bearing looked like at disassembly. We built an iPad system that followed the card logic exactly, added the measurement and image data the cards couldn't carry, and gave the foreman a view of the whole floor for the first time. Six months after launch, capacity had tripled.
Read the full story
Legal services
Stabilizing a system nobody fully understood.
A legal staffing agency's developer of twenty years fell ill and left suddenly — no passwords, no documentation. The FileMaker core was solid, but a web portal on Amazon's cloud had been bolted on by other developers, and data was moving between systems with nothing verifying it arrived. We simplified back to what was reliable, stabilized the emails, and started moving the portal's work back into FileMaker. Before the rebuild finished the owner sold the business. Everything exported intact.
Read the full story
Why me
- Building and rescuing FileMaker systems since 1990 — software sold across whole industries, customer systems built for one company, and systems for factories and creative shops.
- I also build outside FileMaker — web apps, databases and connections to other software, which is exactly what "extend, don't replace" takes.
- Author of The Last Interface — a book on where business software is heading as AI ends the era of interfaces we had to learn. How it connects to what I build.
- Based in Oklahoma. Remote work anywhere FileMaker runs.
Straight answers
Is FileMaker dead?
Not dead. Cooked: terminal, with a few good years left. Claris ships a release every year and has said where it's heading: AI development tools aimed at developers, and new optional add-ons for FileMaker Server. It's also
retiring Claris Studio in March 2027. None of that is a reason to replace a system that works. It's a reason to have a plan you control, and a system documented well enough that any competent developer can maintain it.
Longer answer here.
Claris keeps talking about AI. Do I need to do anything?
Not this quarter. Claris's AI work is mostly tools for developers, so they can change FileMaker systems faster. For you it raises a few decisions: whether AI tools may work on your system, when to upgrade, and whether the new server add-ons are worth paying for.
What Claris's AI direction means for owners.
My developer retired and left no documentation. Can you take over cold?
Yes — that's the most common way engagements start. The assessment exists to turn an undocumented system into a documented one before anything gets changed.
More on how the handoff works here.
Can a web app really run on top of FileMaker?
Yes. FileMaker has built-in ways for a web app to read and write its data, and at a small business's volume they work fine. Your data stays where it is; your staff keeps using FileMaker; the web app is an addition, not a replacement.
Walkthrough with a fleet-manager example.
What does this cost?
The triage call is free. The System Assessment is $250 or $500, depending on the size of the system. Everything after it, Stewardship, extensions and migrations, is quoted from what the assessment finds, as good, better and best options, so you're never buying an open-ended estimate. If you go ahead within 60 days, the full assessment fee comes off the first work.
Full breakdown on the pricing page.
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