low code | VSoft archITekt

W jaki sposób low-code może pomóc firmie produkcyjnej?

How can low-code help a manufacturing company?

Regardless of what area a manufacturing company operates in - almost all seem to face similar challenges. Whether it's the food industry, heavy machinery manufacturing or perhaps a pharmaceutical company - evolving systems, computerisation and process automation affect the way a business operates. To keep up with the technologically developing world, you might need to hire a professional and constantly learning, and preferably a large team of IT specialists. Manufacturing companies rarely have a vast pool of such specialists, they are usually individuals. Fortunately, today's low-code solutions offer assistance that proves almost invaluable given the high demand for IT workers and relatively low supply of them. What is low-code? Using a low-code development platform (LCDP) consists in replacing traditional programming by a manually typed code with the possibility of applying tools that are mostly (but not entirely!) available in a graphical form and allow for software development by the ...

Low-code: does performance matter?

"Begin with the end in mind" that’s the second one of “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” by Stephen Covey. Does it apply when implementing a low-code platform? In my opinion, yes, and very much so. I have recently had a talk with a potential customer who is having problems with a system based on low-code. The very construction and implementation of the system took place without any problems, but over time it turned out that the platform used is completely not adapted to the size of the business and is not able to support the required amount of data (although from the perspective of "traditional" systems, these volumes are nothing extraordinary). Unfortunately, this pattern is repeated relatively often. There are many manufacturers of low-code platforms who have focused only on the fancy user interface and the speed of building small applications. However, they often lack experience or an idea how to approach more complex systems that appear in large organizations. They promise nirvana and u...

VSoft archITekt now available in the cloud

Our clients, in particular financial institutions, pay special attention to data security. For this reason, until recently, most of them preferred to store data on their own servers. Therefore, VSoft archITekt was used primarily in the on-premises model. In recent years however, the perception of data storage has gradually changed. Companies not wanting to deal with maintaining their own servers are increasingly choosing to use cloud services. To meet these needs, we have provided a service that allows you to run applications built on our platform in the cloud. Thanks to Microsoft Azure, it is possible to meet the highest standards in terms of availability and security. Companies already having an Azure subscription, can now purchase archITekt from Azure Marketplace just like any other service. Users can conveniently install and run applications in the cloud, directly from archITekt Studio. Our partners and clients appreciate flexibility, therefore archITekt is still available free of char...

archITekt - Generowanie dokumentów w doradztwie inwestycyjnym

archITekt – Generating documents in investment advisory

After publication of my last post, "How to Create a Mail Merge System in 5 Easy Steps", I received a lot of feedback from users of our platform. It turned out that I focused on how to build a complete application, but I passed over the extensive capabilities of the Document Generation Module itself. In the following paragraphs I will try to make up for it by using an example of an advisory and sales process for investment products. A day in the life of an advisor Imagine an investment advisor. She acts like a broker in the sale of various types of financial products and at the same time advises clients on their choice. As it is with bigger amounts and long-term obligations, each of her proposals must be delivered in the form of the written offer. In addition to typical elements (customer data, investment size, security), such a document contains descriptions of the proposed products and specification of all options selected by the customer. It also depicts a simulation of costs and reven...

Jak stworzyć system do korespondencji seryjnej w 5 prostych krokach

How to create a system for mail merge in 5 simple steps

The need to generate and send personalized documents or otherwise, mail merge is still very common in many companies. It is used in communication with clients or partners. Formerly, printed and sent by post, now the same documents are sent to customers by e-mail. There are many business cases here: invoices, settlements, various types of letters and contracts. Companies deal with this challenge in two different ways: In large organizations, IT team implements specialized modules which, after integration with other systems, generate documents on demand. Unfortunately, these modules are often very "technical": integration requires programming work and document templates must be prepared, for example, in the form of XSLT transforms (sic!). More often, however, companies use simple mechanisms such as mail merge available in MS Office or simply fill out documents by hand. Still, the lack of automation makes this process tedious and prone to human error. Is there a ...

How to choose the right low-code platform?

A low-code tool can bring revolution to IT landscape of your company. It can boost development and prototyping of business applications if you suffer from lack of experienced programmers. In my personal opinion, it has tremendous value and you should at least consider it. But decision to use low-code is just the first step. There are many platforms available, and they differ from each other. To choose the one that is right for your needs, you need to answer yourself several questions. In the following article I’ll try to ask such questions and suggest possible answers. What exactly are your business needs? As many other things in IT, low-code is just a tool. It’s pointless to implement low-code just to “implement cool low-code”. Such approach may solve some of your challenges by accident, but at the same time it may generate many problems. To avoid that, firstly, you need to realize your business needs and determine deeper purpose for the tools you are going to implement. Here are sev...

Jaka jest różnica między low-code i no-code?

What is the difference between low-code and no-code?

The term “low-code” is not new. It has been coined by Forrester in 2014 to classify “development platforms that focused on development simplicity and ease of use. These platforms allowed developers and users of all skill levels to code applications, without having the outright need to know coding.” The trend caught on like wildfire. But in the meantime - frankly, I could not determine when exactly – the “no-code” term appeared. And it caused lot of confusion to determine what is what. In the following paragraphs I’ll try to show my point of view and clear it up. The low-code / no-code definition The trick is that at the first glance both terms seem to be self-explanatory. And many sources just define them as: Low-code – platforms that speed up development by allowing to build rough applications graphically for further customization. They limit demand for coding, but still require such to build final product. No-code – platforms that allow to buil...

What is the role of low-code in an organization

There are some producers of low code platforms promising that with their tool you can build almost everything in nearly every situation. That’s an overpromise. And it’s toxic. I spoke to many CIO’s who had believed in such a message and were disappointed by reality they experienced afterwards. My experience is that low code is not going to flood the entire IT market. It has its own role, hand in hand with bespoke software and out-of-the-box products. Large organizations Formerly, there was a golden rule for the IT landscape of large organizations to implement fully tailored solutions to support core business and to rely on out-of-the-box products in all areas of support. In effect, an organization could fully invest in custom development within the area that would differentiate it from the competition and bring the greatest added value. At the same time the company benefited from more affordable prices and business knowledge embedded in out-of-the-box products. Sounds perfect, ...

Rozwiązanie low-code dla złożonych, wysokowydajnych systemów? Brzmi nieprawdopodobnie. A może jednak nie?

Low-code solution for complex, high-performance systems? Sounds impossible. Or is it?

There is a stereotype that low-code platforms create software that is slow and limited in functionality. As with any stereotype, there is some truth to that, but not much. To find out what the reality is, at first, we need to start with how high-performance systems are built using general-purpose programming languages. Let’s get to the bottom of this and then confront it with what low-code has to offer. Is custom programming really such a great advantage compared to low-code solutions? Or is it a drawback? What makes software “slow”? What does "slow" really mean in terms of a typical enterprise application? By "typical" I mean a 3-layer classic: Web UI + service backend + databases. "Slow" can come from: Database queries being far from optimal - missing indexes, outdated statistics, bad join strategies etc. Unnecessary queries - missing caches or “chatty” algorithms assuming that fetching more data from database or external services is free and i...

Who is a Citizen Developer?

The "Citizen Developer" term seems to be almost as popular as low-code/no-code platforms themselves. At the first sight, its definition is quite simple: The person from business department (not IT) who has basic IT knowledge and develops business applications But it is a very broad description. Let’s go deeper and wonder: Who exactly are such people? Where do they come from? What is their background? I had a lot of discussions with my mates and clients about that. Here are the insights. The most obvious candidates to become Citizen Developers are business owners of IT systems within the organization. They are responsible for implemented solutions. Regardless of whether the apps are out-of-the-box or custom implementations, the owners are forced to understand - on general technical level - what is "under the hood". Such experience gives them perfect background to get familiar with low-code tools and build software solutions ...

Tag: low code