1C:Enterprise: Top 5 Things to Know for Beginners.

1C:Enterprise development platform has been known for almost 20 years now. Thousands of companies, both large and medium-sized, use 1C solutions to streamline their business processes and develop new apps with the proprietary development toolkit (EDT, or enterprise development tools).

1C solutions have been successfully venturing into global markets, such as Latin America, Asia and the Middle East.

What are the reasons for such overwhelming popularity? Let’s see.

Business model

1C:Enterprise uses a franchise model of distribution and therefore can be likened to a “software McDonald’s.” Basically, this means that the parent corporation (the headquarters) does not develop products itself, but provides a platform and technology for their development, as well as the guidelines and support.

By using our platform, companies can tap into its numerous benefits and develop their own tools on that basis. And it’s worth mentioning that the berrier to entry is quite low thanks to the fast learning curve, onboarding programs for entry-level developers, a large user community, as well as multilanguage support.

Such an approach to software development has at least three major benefits:

• rapid distribution of software due to a growing network of partners who are seeking opportunities to expand;
• the consistency of end products (since they are based upon the same technology);
• attractive prices (since partners already have access to the core technology and can build apps on that basis freeing up resources).

As of now, 1C cooperates with a few thousand partners worldwide, who, in their turn, build and sell products to end users.

Low-code development platform

1C:Enterprise is one of the first low-code/no-code platforms that emerged on the market — in fact, about 12 years before the term “low code” was coined. As a result, our company possesses huge expertise in that respect compared to competitors with only 3–5 years of experience with low/no-code solutions.

Unlike traditional coding, even with high-level languages like Python or JavaScript, low-code development has a relatively short learning curve, so it’s more accessible to newbies or people without an IT background. Most of the work is done via an intuitive graphic interface, and only a small amount of coding is required (and in some cases, no coding at all.) At the same time, low code enables developers to create full-fledged applications with various functionality and not just some curbed versions of them.

This makes it possible even for end-users (such as accountants or sales managers) to quickly and easily build apps for their work needs rather than load the IT department and wait for months until the task is completed.

For example, if a non-programmer goes to any web page and looks at its source code, they will most likely make little sense of how it’s designed. Whereas, with a 1C-based app, the structure is quite clear and minimalistic. To build a simple app for storing files (an analog of Google Drive), you’ll just need to create a metadata structure out of one object from the corresponding class.

How does it work?

1С:Enterprise development platform is comprised of pre-coded metadata classes, each of them being a fully functional module of an application. So a developer just needs to create an object descending from a metadata class and then customize it as needed.

Each metadata class has:

• the data structure, which usually consists of several tables;
• the behavior in the form of business logic and restrictions (e.g., only specific data formats can be input);
• the interface.

For example, there’s a class called an accounting register that can automatically calculate balance over a set period, check final sums, etc. This module can be implemented, for instance, into an accounting app. So when an object “ledger” is created based on that class, it already inherits all the features of the class. It can be either used “as is,” or you can further customize it, rename, add or remove functions — and all this without or with only a little code.

However, there’re also certain limitations to the low-code approach. One of the most obvious downsides is that it’s impossible to build a universal low-code platform — it’s always tailored for specific use cases. So you can’t just code any type of application using the same platform. For example, WordPress is good for creating a certain kind of websites but can hardly be used for building a high-loaded online service.

Likewise, 1C:Enterprise mainly focuses on building business applications, such as ERP solutions for managing workflows, accounting, production, warehousing, HR operations, CRM systems, etc. But you cannot build a 3D shooter or an online store with 1C.

Final thoughts

1C solutions have gained popularity for good reasons — they are powerful, flexible and well-suited for business needs. Most importantly, the learning curve for a 1C developer is rather short. It usually takes only three weeks of intense study to become a junior 1C developer capable of creating applications with up to 10 metadata objects — as compared to at least one year of preparation to become a junior JavaScript developer.