Low-code + No-code = Mo Code? How to Build an App with No Coding Skills
Low-code or no-code are terms that are single-handedly transforming the relationships that start-ups have with developers. Where did they come from, and why? This article highlights everything one should know about this up-and-coming tool that is letting people with no coding background create complex working apps in very little time using very little money.
To understand this trend, it is also important to understand that nowadays a lot of the work that developers do is becoming redundant simply because the basic idea behind many applications on the market is the same. An online shopping platform for shoes can use the same software as a grocery store app. The differences are purely cosmetic. In other words, there is no need for reinventing the wheel when it comes to coding for new software when the solution already exists and is ready to use.
To begin with, what is low-code and no-code? As their names suggest, they are platforms that require either low levels of coding skill to create web or mobile apps, or none at all. These platforms have modular designs, allowing users to patch together various services that complete the overall task. These services can be found, executed, and somewhat customized without having to alter the code that powers them deep within. They cut out the expensive middlemen, developers, and often provide quick results.
There are many advantages to low-code/no-code solutions. Most of them are easily scalable, affordable, user-friendly, easy-to-use, and they produce results in much less time than traditional app development methods. Scalability comes from the fact that they are a patchwork of independent services that firstly, do not need to be coded from scratch, and secondly, are each maintained and updated by their own creators. Finding high quality “plug-in” or services to piece together a low-code/no-code app is key to making sure it will never falter even as the number of users increase.
Secondly, customers can compare the price of employing these independent services with the price of employing a team of developers and see that the latter is almost always the more expensive choice. Knowing to code is a strength and the cost of hiring developers supports this fact. So while developers may aid in customizing an app with the smallest of details, if the customer’s goal is to create a working final product using the least amount of resources, which is advisable for start-ups, low-code platforms are the way to go.
Over the years, coding has built a reputation that boosts the image of those who have mastered it. It is tedious, extremely particular, difficult to understand, and let’s be honest, it looks like a bunch of sci-fi gibberish to the untrained eye, putting people who know how to do it on a pedestal. It limits game-changing app developing to only a handful of people in the specific field of coding. If a non-coder has a brilliant idea for a ground-breaking app that can change the world, there’s nothing they can do about it, at least not by themselves. Low-code and no-code platforms change that. It gives them the tools they need, without having to master any of the codes behind them (taking coders off that pedestal) making app development attainable for the common folk.
The secret that most developers won’t tell people is that most of the code they write is copy-and-pasted at least to a certain extent. Even if that’s not the case, a lot of their code can be replaced by simple low-code or no-code services out there. Since developers go through the task of writing and rewriting, searching, copying-and-pasting, it is reasonable to expect long wait times till the product can potentially be launched, that is, if there are no bugs or other delays in the process. Low-code and no-code platforms take out that time and give it back to the customer to use in optimizing the idea behind the application, advertising it, and doing anything else that could help their app succeed. Even if customers are adamant that a developer participate in the process, this solution allows for all their time and energy to be spent only customizing the unique concepts behind the app, not writing the monotonous general code.
Impeer, the newest blockchain developing platform on the market, is an excellent example of a low-code/no-code solution. Its modular template allows for the fast, precise, easy, and affordable creation of complex blockchain networks that otherwise take massive amounts of time and resources to build. It will facilitate the next step in technology, giving ordinary people with extraordinary ideas a chance to be the next Satoshi Nakamoto, or maybe someone even better.
