Building Apps Without Code: 7 Options For Your Enterprise
Application building no longer means learning to code. Here are seven products and services that can help you develop apps without developing programming skills.
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Whether you call it shadow IT, the democratization of IT, or business units taking responsibility for their own applications, there's no question that employees who aren't on the IT payroll are developing applications for the enterprise.
While business unit employees come to the development table with plenty of user and business process experience, they tend to not have skills in traditional programming languages or application development disciplines. For the IT professional, the question isn't whether this "out of IT" development is going to happen — that train has left the station. Rather, it's how to work with these business unit application developers to make sure the apps they build are functional, secure, and unlikely to bring down the rest of the enterprise IT infrastructure.
These aren't small considerations. When you go to industry gatherings, it's easy to find groups of executives talking about the way that "rogue" applications have opened vulnerabilities in enterprise databases or blown up the capacity planning models for mainframe hardware and software spending. All of that is quite true, and yet quite easily managed if IT acts to get ahead of the curve.
[ Shadow IT got you down? Read Shadow IT: 8 Ways To Cope. ]
One way to get ahead of the development curve is to play an active role in choosing the tools business units use when they're building their own applications. With a hand in tool selection, you can make sure that the applications built conform to company standards of functionality and security. Fortunately for IT managers, there are plenty of options available for building very solid apps. Unfortunately, there are A LOT of options available for building apps. Cutting through the clutter can be a major undertaking.
That's why we've done some of that clutter-cutting for you. We can't make the decision for you, but we can narrow the field a bit. We came up with seven candidates for packages or services that will let a department or workgroup build an application without having to build a talent pool filled with programmers.
Do understand that these aren't the only possible tools that are out there. With time (and no consideration for your willingness to click to new pages) we could easily have made this an article on "The 78 no-code application tools you need to consider." But we like you more than that. So we've narrowed it to seven, secure in the knowledge that we'll be hearing from representatives of the other 71 in the next week or so.
We are curious: Are you using any of these tools in your organization? Or are you using ones that we didn't include? Either way, we'd like to hear from you with your experience of how this class of tool can work in the enterprise. It's clear that application development no longer means learning to write code. The question now is how good the applications (and their work within the IT infrastructure) are going to be. Let us know what you think in the comments section below.
When you look at Canvas, you see a great deal about getting rid of paper. In many ways that's what Canvas is all about: Taking your current paper-based workflow and putting it on a screen and in the cloud. All of this happens through a drag-and-drop interface that doesn't require any extra coding. The Canvas environment also brings with it a cloud instance in which all documents are stored until they're forwarded to devices or systems you designate.
Canvas has a free trial and versions of the service that range in price from $13 to $31 per month, with pricing for large enterprises available.
Zoho is a cloud-based office suite that has been used by companies for nearly a decade. Zoho includes the standard array of personal productivity applications as well as a number of database, CRM, and other small-business applications. It also includes Zoho Creator, which allows business folks to design and create applications through a drag-and-drop interface.
Pricing for Zoho Creator starts free for a limited number of users and apps (three each), moving to paid plans that range from $5 to $15 per month, per user. Bulk licenses for user populations greater than 1,000 are also available. Zoho Creator is an interesting choice for those organizations looking to build customer-facing apps. Various licenses include credit-card capabilities, shopping carts, and placement in a Zoho app marketplace.
Intuit Quickbase is, at its heart, a database. But it's a database that doesn't require you to learn SQL syntax or use tools like Python or PHP to access from the Web. One of the most obvious characteristics of Intuit Quickbase is that you could be forgiven for thinking that there isn't a database at all. You simply define forms for looking at and manipulating information, and the database underneath "just happens."
Once the form is defined and laid out on a desktop browser, the Web layout for smartphones and tablets also "just happens," because Quickbase is a Web-only service that generates adaptive pages for whichever devices are accessing the application and data. With no programming required for database definition or application interface and workflow, and database hosting in the cloud, Intuit Quickbase is a low-stress way for a group to get started in the application business.
A free trial of Intuit Quickbase is available and pricing plans range from $15 to $40 per user, per month.
FileMaker Pro 14 is, in some ways, similar to Intuit QuickBase. It lets people build applications and create the underlying database with simple drag-and-drop operations. It differs from Intuit Quickbase in at least one huge and critical way, though: While Intuit Quickbase is entirely in the cloud and on the Web, FileMaker Pro 14 is primarily based on self-hosted and app technology (though it can certainly be used to build Web applications, as well).
We've covered FileMaker Pro 14 before, so I won't go into similar depth here. The main thing to keep in mind is that, while FileMaker is wholly owned by Apple, the development platform and apps are available on Windows and Apple platforms, with Web applications accessible from any device.
Various FileMaker 14 products are available on a subscription basis with prices ranging from $9 to $29 per user, per month. It's important to note that FileMaker's licensing and technology assume that you're going to be building these applications for internal use. If you're looking for a platform that will be perfect for a customer-facing app, then there are other solutions that will more easily fit that need.
If you're in the enterprise world, you know Salesforce. For many people and organizations, Salesforce defines software-as-a-service (SaaS). Teams of IT professionals spend their days building applications on and around Salesforce, but with the Salesforce1 platform -- and specifically, with the Lightning canvas within Salesforce1 -- business unit employees can go a long way toward defining their own applications.
In order for the applications to be most useful, they're going to need to take advantage of your enterprise databases, and you're probably not going to want to turn a business unit non-programmer loose on either the database or the APIs to get there. This is an opportunity for cooperation and application integration, but it still starts with the application defined by the business unit. And that's a good thing.
Pricing for the Force.com bundle that includes the Salesforce1 platform ranges from $25 to $150 per user, per month, with custom enterprise pricing available. If you're a Salesforce.com customer, it's possible you're already paying for this. And if that's the case, the opportunities for cooperation with your business units are bigger and better.
If you want to give this whole "no-code application" concept a try, then AppArchitect could be what you're looking for. With an interface described as being most like PowerPoint, this service is designed for business users rather than programmers. Best of all, it's free.
AppArchitect has a rather smooth, if somewhat simplistic, user interface that's reached through its website. It's not an "enterprise class" development environment, but it's entirely possible that your business units aren't looking for enterprise-class power -- that's why they have you.
In December 2014, AppArchitect was acquired by AppGyver, and it's not yet clear what that will mean for the service. Until things change, though, this could be the perfect service for the workgroup that wants to try spreading its application wings before it leaps out of the nice, safe IT nest.
These are seven ways to make applications happen without requiring a programmer to get the ball rolling. Does the mere thought of them fill you with dread? Or, do you see these and others like them as the future of app development? Are you still planning to place your bets on someone with Java or C++ experience? I'm looking forward to seeing your thoughts in the comments section below -- no programming required.
These are seven ways to make applications happen without requiring a programmer to get the ball rolling. Does the mere thought of them fill you with dread? Or, do you see these and others like them as the future of app development? Are you still planning to place your bets on someone with Java or C++ experience? I'm looking forward to seeing your thoughts in the comments section below -- no programming required.
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