Hmm.  If that's the case then they really ought to discontinue the "Advanced" version and roll all the diagnostic utilities into the standard version.  Just my 2 cents worth.

mspj,

Don't get me wrong...I don't want to lose that type of functionality. I am really really hoping they go the way of a FileMaker Go for desktop. Free to download, free to run local, non-hosted, single-user files. Same as Go for iOS. I think that is a more viable approach than the runtime. It helps us as developers with the deployment and updating also. If you get what I mean.

Hang in there. I really hope the fear everyone has is for naught. I think what you are doing is great. And highly needed. Kudos to you for making it work.

 

I was thinking that FileMaker Go for desktops wouldn't work to replace runtimes because of the concurrent license costs. I totally forgot that Go currently runs files local on the device.  I think having to download Go for desktop to run a local version file would be a really good idea for FMI.  They get to engage with the end user, get the marketing info and start a new relationship with your customer, before they use your solution.   Now I am going to be disappointed if they don't come out with a go for desktop solution.

Yeah. It gets our foot in the door, without it costing the customer anything.

I'm late to this discussion, but like MSPJ I was considering upgrading to FMPA 14 precisely for the sake of improving my runtime projects -- developing solutions for individual desktop end-users who have no budget (nor enough tech savvy) for dealing directly with FileMaker Pro. In my case (since I have a totally different day job) the loss of Runtime would not send me to a competing platform; I'd just cease being the small-time not-really-for-profit developer that I've been.

It's plausible that customers like me and MSPJ are not typical. I'm also hopeful FileMaker will offer us a relatively seamless transition to an FMP Go desktop-friendly solution. But I suspect that we (this minority of developers catering to non-corporate end users) will be taken into account only if we speak up. 

developing solutions for individual desktop end-users who have no budget

Is this really the space you want to live in?

I can understand doing pro-bono work and FMI has really good pricing for those kind of projects.  But that's about contributing to the greater good, not building a business.

FMI has recently said that the current runtimes will be in the next version so you have a great many years of useful life out of them.  Nothing to worry about.

If you are trying to build a business you are on the wrong track.  Find customers that are willing to pay.

 

Wim - that seems a little narrow-minded.  Are you suggesting that no one has built a successful business selling to end users?  So Intuit really needs to rethink their business model because they aren't making enough money on Quicken and Turbotax? Like Espringer, this is not my day job - but I do hope this will develop into a bigger business eventually, and in the meantime, I'm providing a desperately needed product.  

 

 

To make a living on a product that sells for $50...you have to sell 10s of thousands per year. To do that, you need a heavy marketing budget.

It's a tough gamble.

Wim's thoughts aren't narrow minded...he just knows there are easier ways to make money doing development.

Edited July 17, 201510 yr by Josh Ormond

Wim - that seems a little narrow-minded.  Are you suggesting that no one has built a successful business selling to end users?  

 

You forgot the "with no budget"... 

Of course you can build a successful company selling to end users.   Bu like Josh said, it's a volume game.  You'd have to sell a lot to make a living.  And with "a lot" also comes "a lot" of potential support calls, etc...

 

This topic has been quiet for nearly 5 years and someone recently messaged me wondering where I'd gotten to with this issue. Thought I'd give a quick update for anyone who is interested.

I'm currently on FMP 18, and the runtime is still there, but my understanding is it will be gone for real in 19. So the clock has started and I figure I have 2 or 3 years if not longer before 18 won't run on Windows.  I have not had the time to move towards an alternative platform. Maybe I'll get 4 or 5 years out of 18. 

In the time since, I've developed a hosted small business product related to my family version. However, a hosted model is still completely out of the question for the family version.

I continue to work on the family version for essentially zero profit because it is needed.  My kids had special needs growing up and the need to manage all that paperwork is what led to my developing the product. I am committed to maintaining it because my customers tell me it is life saving for them.  And they have some very sobering stories.  (And now of course there is Covid19).

Reading back over this thread, I still feel that the comments about this end user business model are not appropriate (I'm not talking about Claris's model - I'm talking about people like me).  Even if a business like this is difficult to sustain, that would be my problem - it shouldn't bear on this discussion.    Suggesting that people like me shouldn't complain because we had time to prepare is totally off the topic -  this isn't a small business forum - it's a filemaker forum. I'm not complaining about running my business - I'm complaining about a product I've used for over a decade which has removed a significant functionality and offered no alternative.   And now that I have a business version, it is still valuable for me to keep the individual version on this platform because of the shared code base and to enable parallel development. 

Five years later and Claris has offered no alternative path for runtime users. They have not  communicated anything about their decision or the possible impact nor offered any kind of assistance with the transition.

What continues to elude me is why they wouldn't simply offer a reduced fee runtime license.  I have sold my solution to well over a thousand customers. FMI got nothing from that, so I get why that's a problem to them.  But if they offered a runtime license of $50, that would be $50,000. That's 100 times the current cost of an individual license. I could sell my customers on a fee of around $50 - but very few of them could afford $540 for a full license. (And the ones who could, are not the ones desperately in need of this kind of help managing their medical paperwork). 

If a runtime is identical to a regular install with the only limitation being that only one solution can be opened, I don't see why it would cost Claris significantly to maintain it. Instead of maintaining the infrastructure in the standalone product to generate runtimes - why not simply sell the product with an activation process that only allows one database to be opened?  They could then remove all the code from FMP (which they are about to do) and manage it as a particular license type. 

I've tried to figure out a way of bringing this to Claris, but I'm not sure who to approach with this.  Any suggestions?

Michael

PS - To offer another perspective, I used to use Crashplan to backup my home computers. It was probably too inexpensive for what they offered, and at one point, they abruptly decided to close the individual offering, and not provide a way for people to easily save their archives. If you had 10 years of backups on their servers, they were simply going to be deleted. They tried to get people to go to a business plan which was much more expensive. At the time, I decided to abandon their company and not even consider their business offering. This was not primarily because of the cost but because the way they handled the change of their business model made me lose trust in them as a company.  Had they offered a way for people to download their archives and continue to use their desktop software locally, it would have shown that they valued their customers, and I would have been more likely to continue with them.

Similarly, I don't blame Claris for making a decision to focus their efforts wherever they see the most benefit. What I am bothered by is the decision to offer no help to a customer base of developers, some of whom were dependent on this feature. Can they afford to lose those customers with no damage to their revenue? I don't doubt it. But is it a good idea to show customers that you don't include the impact on them in your business plan?  All companies put new development work where it will benefit them the most.  But that's not the same as removing legacy features. Removing things is not the same as not adding new ones.  I have seen no communication whatever from Claris on this topic other than the notification 5 years ago that it was being deprecated.  

I think it's too early to judge. There's already an alternative in the form of Filemaker Go, and this could be expanded to the desktop. Though I agree with you about the need for more clarity from Claris.

 

2 hours ago, MSPJ said:

I'm complaining about a product I've used for over a decade which has removed a significant functionality and offered no alternative.

Why is it on them to offer an alternative?

 

2 hours ago, MSPJ said:

Similarly, I don't blame Claris for making a decision to focus their efforts wherever they see the most benefit. What I am bothered by is the decision to offer no help to a customer base of developers, some of whom were dependent on this feature.

They've been extremely diligent in pre-announcing the deprecation and then the actual deprecation.  5 years worth of advance notice counts as serious help I think.  That's 5 years to migrate away and build up skills in whatever environment is better suited to your needs.

 

2 hours ago, MSPJ said:

I have seen no communication whatever from Claris on this topic other than the notification 5 years ago that it was being deprecated.  

Every year for quite a few years now, Claris/FileMaker holds a yearly roadmap webinar plus a new-version-preview webinar where the runtime feature comes up.

Have you looked into SBA licensing?