Secret Weapon Labs

Back in the say of FileMaker 5, when we were thankful for the new emboss and engrave formatting tool in FileMaker, a website was created called LayoutMode.com

I don’t know who started this site, but the premise was simple and beautiful enough: if you design it, people will come to see it. It was created as an online homage and graphical learning tool for FileMaker users and developers to highlight beautiful and elegant FileMaker layouts. It was hardly ever updated and has now been taken down and replaced by a FileMaker link farm.

Since then, I’ve seens and done the usual Apple+Shift+3 (or 4) to capture some of the more elegant and decent FileMaker layouts I’ve seen. They were for my own personal reference, but at the very least other FileMakers should be seeing this stuff and learning rather than producing the butt-ugly designs that they have been. Having said that, I feel as though I’ve let go of a little FileMaker secret. This is how I generate my own quality designs and if it creates more competition because there are higher-quality layouts being used by clients, there is less potential redesign work for me (the bulk of my business). But surely, some of you, if not most of you will find it helpful.

So here it is. It is stored and maintained on Flickr as a group named Layout Mode (http://www.flickr.com/groups/LayoutMode/pool)

FileMaker, Layout Mode, Design, Databases, Apple