Everybody wants a slice of the low-code software pie, or so it seems. Yes there are low-code platform specialists and yes there are low-code/no-code magicians also working in this space, but now, every other tech vendor worth their salt seems to (quite suddenly) want to claim skin in the game.
There’s barely a database company, a security specialist, an Internet of Things (IoT) player, a User eXperience firm or an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Customer Relationship Management (CRM) or Human Capital Management (HCM) organization that doesn’t appear to have a low-code offering bubbling. Even if they don’t have a product on their roadmap, these firms can inevitably produce an “evangelist practitioner futurist” with an opinion on low-code.
To put it simply, since the turn of the decade, low-code is one of the hottest nuggets in and on the technology industry’s hype cycle.
Where low-code surfaces
The usual suspect list at what is arguably the more purist end of the low-code space includes (in alphabetical order) Appian, Mendix and OutSystems, with firms like Betty Blocks, Pega and Zoho also in the mix, plus of course it would be unwise to ignore low-code work coming out of dedicated software development companies like Microsoft. Then, of course, Google announced its acquisition of AppSheet in January 2020, but this is not a list of who’s who, so let’s look for specific developments.
These days owned by Siemens, Mendix has been around since 2005. Now almost in double figures with its platform version number, Mendix 9 offers most if not all of what users have enjoyed in versions 1-8, but some new functionalities too. The company says that this release extends the core low-code principles of abstraction and automation (abstracting users upwards away from the guts of low-code and providing them with automated controls that perform some programming and data actions without a need for hands-on involvement) to data integration, Artificial Intelligence (AI), workflow and process automation.
If we have to split that bunch into a) still potentially quite technical and so mostly used by professional software developers & programmers and b) business-focused enough to be potentially used by so-called ‘citizen developers’ who aren’t necessarily trained software engineers — then it would be a) data integration and AI for engineers and b) workflow and process automation for less technical users. Mendix argues that all four of these functions sit inside the “core stuff that enterprises need for digital transformation” family, so logically groups them as one in that sense.
The Mendix Workflow Editor brings low-code to process automation. This means that by using a comparatively simple drag-and-drop interface, business users and software developers can visualize business processes and design and build workflows that incorporate human and automated actions and relevant logic. These workflows can be delivered to users as standalone tools, or as part of larger Mendix-based solutions.
The process automation process
The company insists that this Workflow Editor tool works with its total software platform offering to go beyond the process automation capabilities possible with standalone Robotic Process Automation (RPA) or workflow tools. Users can access “virtually any” data source, incorporate AI services and create consumer-grade interfaces for users to actually use the resulting apps. This software includes customizable pages, logic and starter templates for widely used workflows to jumpstart the process automation process, so-to-speak.
Also on the software smörgåsbord here is the Mendix Data Hub, a function to give both citizen and professional developers the power to find and use the right data for their applications via a curated catalog that enables IT to maintain control over data access and use. Data Hub exposes internal and external data resources to appear as if they are local, where they can be incorporated into applications via a drag-and-drop interface.
“With Data Hub, we can now build modern end-user portals right on top of our legacy systems, reusing data from our main data sources,” says Leon Schipper, information technology advisor at the Municipality of Rotterdam, Netherlands. “Our residents have fewer forms to fill in and their overall experience is greatly improved. From an operations perspective, we’re able to eliminate data duplication, more easily comply with regulations and reduce our dependence on external contractors.”
There is also a revamped Control Center function in Mendix 9. This gives IT managers a view and centralized oversight over the entire Mendix landscape running inside an organization. That means oversight into not just users, but also applications and resources. For this kind of enterprise software, you’d want granular role-based security, audit trails and visibility into resource usage; that’s because although there’s intelligent automation at play here, we do still want to be able to know what our citizen developers are doing and creating. So that’s what Mendix has provided.
The end result (when successfully deployed) of this type of technology actually comes back out of the low-code/no-code tier and delivers a chance for hard-core software application developers to be more productive when creating the really complex value-add software that a company needs.
Low-code for high-code coders
The next chapter in this story is of course when the software engineers themselves use low-code automation tools to fuel their development of lower-level code (or in the context of this story, we could say “high code” software) development.
Mendix says, enough already, we’re doing that… and this version 9 release introduces the Mendix AI Performance Bot, a developer’s intelligent assistant that ensures apps follow design and performance best practices. The company claims it has seen some 60% of Mendix developers already use the artificial intelligence capabilities of Mendix Assist to accelerate modeling. So now, the new AI Performance Bot automatically identifies anti-patterns and provides step-by-step recommendations for fixes, or the option to resolve quickly with automatic refactoring.
Visual Conflict Resolution is another developer productivity enhancement in Mendix 9, enabling easy resolution of differences and merging of changes when large teams of developers work in numerous parallel branches.
During these times of high time for low-code, we can see that low-code is helping no-coders code, but it’s also helping coders code code in high-code, but with tools on the low-code road… so if nothing else, we can certainly say that low-code is à la mode.
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May 03, 2021 at 06:12PM
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Mendix Goes Low-Code On Workflows - Forbes
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