Designing A Layout That Works...

[Matt_]

Hi There,

I've been working on developing a FileMaker solution for a couple years now. I've done all of the research I need to do to make everything work data-wise, it's in about 40 different pieces (from me trying to make each piece of the puzzle work without messing up something else!).

What I'm designing is a student information/administratio n system that manages all of the course selection, scheduling, etc. By no means is this a small task!

I'm kind of stumped when it comes to designing a layout/GUI that works for the application. I've played around with a few different ideas as far as design goes and I'm not really satisfied with how it looks.

I'm hoping to get some suggestions on what the best method for designing an interface would be. I'm not really prepared to shell out a bunch of cash for something like Scriptology, and the pre-loaded designs are pretty bland.

Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions on how to design a layout that would look good and function efficiently?

[iMarcW]

If you're looking to have some of the work done for you but don't want to pay, FileMaker's Campus Productivity Kit worked out pretty well for me. I ended up changing it a lot, as would be expected, but a lot of the basic stuff is already set for you, so it saves some time. At the time when I started using it, I actually picked up some techniques from figuring out how the file worked... depends on your level of expertise.

The especially good thing about the starter kits is that they're designed to look good cross-platform. The db's I did based on the templates look a lot better on Windows than the ones I've done myself (on the Mac).

Go to this page and scroll down about 3/4 of the page to find links to the four "starter kits". I don't think they've been updated to include any v.9 technologies like conditional formatting or resizing layouts, but it does have some 8.5 stuff built in:

http://www.filemaker.com/products/fmp/started_quickly.html

Edited July 7, 2008 by Guest

[Vaughan]

My advice (which is often quite unfashionable) is not to worry about whether the interface is pretty but to initially concentrate on usability. People appreciate easy to use software more than they do eye candy, especially for business applications*.

Usability is not easy. It involves a lot of testing.

You might want to determine whether a "data-centric" design is better than a "task-centric" design: some users might might require the former while other users the latter.

*A business application is one that people *must* use to get their work done. Usability is paramount because they want to spend as *little* time as possible using the software. Contrast this with, say, a game where the appearance is paramount, and users want to spend as much time on the software as possible, and they've paid for the software themselves.

As an example, I don't think MYOB is available for PS3 or X-Box 360 yet.