The need to build compelling and highly usable customer, employee and partner facing mobile apps is driving a new breed of app platform – Rapid Application Delivery (RAD).
Platforms specifically designed to meet the needs of multichannel apps that run perfectly on any device and can be changed at the speed of business.
Forrester has termed this new breed of solution as ‘low-code platforms’ and says hand-coding is too slow to develop and deliver many of the applications that companies use to win, serve, and retain customers.
OutSystems SA director Craig Terblanche says organisations are turning to new, low-code application platforms that accelerate app delivery by dramatically reducing the amount of hand-coding required. “Mobile apps are more than just pretty user interfaces – they need to be properly and powerfully connected to your enterprise.”
He says to optimise for speed of delivery, the entire application and its lifecycle must be managed effectively. “Visually develop your mobile app powerfully and fast, using your existing skillset.”
Utilising a visual RAD approach, OutSystems Platform enables any developer to design mobile and responsive UIs without acquiring new skills – harnessing the power of HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript. Developers use one development environment to design the mobile UI as well as develop the backend logic, workflow and integration to legacy systems and cloud services.
“A comprehensive set of pre-built connectors for everything from SAP, Oracle and salesforce.com to databases and cloud services makes accessing and aggregating business data a snap. And you can visually build your own connectors using SOAP and RESTful web services, Java or .NET code,” he explains.
Applications delivered with OutSystems Platform are multi-channel ready from day one. From one application design, one can deploy apps, across iOS, Android, Windows Phone and Web, that can easily incorporate native capabilities like geolocation, camera, notifications, and on-device app integration.
“The applications you create with OutSystems Platform are delivered using open, industry-standard code and stacks. There is no proprietary framework or runtime that locks you in or slows you down.
And our visual RAD approach provides automatic design documentation that survives developer churn, making it easy to maintain large enterprise application portfolios – portfolios that are future proof from changing technology standards and changes in IT staff and skills,” he says.
Creating apps quickly the first time is one thing, but being able to rapidly iterate the apps – based on user feedback and changing requirements – is everything. The key to rapid user adoption is delivering apps that hit the mark the first time and being able to react quickly to new and changing requirements.
“Our visual RAD approach, enterprise scale features, and lifecycle management capabilities give enterprises an unprecedented delivery capacity while utilising their in-house skills. OutSystems Platform delivers new functionality making it simpler than ever for any developer to create, deploy and manage enterprise mobile applications,” he concludes.