How A Certified FileMaker developer in Chicago sees this.

People often think of FileMaker programmers, FileMaker developers, FileMaker experts, and FileMaker specialists as all the same thing. From the outside looking in they might all look like people who work with FileMaker. But from the inside looking out, they appear quite different.

A FileMaker specialist or expert implies (to us at least) someone who does many things, and one of them is FileMaker Pro... and maybe it’s even one of their stronger suits. But that may not be the person you want dedicated to creating your core systems.

A FileMaker programmer (again, in our eyes) is someone who’s very good at coding FileMaker Pro systems, but they’re focused at the feature level. They’re very good at doing specific fixes or tweaks, but they may not be suited for overall design responsibilities. And that’s fine - the world needs programmers! But ask yourself: should this be your key person, or a person who reports to your key person?

A FileMaker developer is someone who is not only expert at writing in FileMaker, like a programmer, but also has experience, perspective, and the ability to envision the entire system and where it needs to be... kind of like a FileMaker architect, or a FileMaker designer.