Showing items from Low Code

Why do companies build custom low-code tools?

• Edmundo Lopez Bobeda, Ph.D.
• Date : March 14, 2022
• Categories : Language engineering
• Tags : Low code ,Mde ,Thinking

In this post I explore some some common reasons that justify the effort of creating a custom low-code tool.

Sell it as a service

There are several low-code startups that are providing app generation services for different niches. There are offers like website generators, mobile app generators, landing pages, generators, internal app generators, and others. In those cases, the custom app generator becomes the service of a company. Since the core of the business is providing the low-code solution, it is developed in-house and tailored to the needs of the clients, which are usually a predefined segment. Examples of this approach range from tools as simple as Leadpages to complex app creation frameworks like Mendix.

Should a company use a low code solution or an MDE tool?

• Edmundo Lopez Bobeda, Ph.D.
• Date : March 11, 2022
• Categories : Language engineering
• Tags : Low code ,Mde ,Thinking

When researching low-code and MDE software, I realized that the former is marketing itself as a solution; while the latter as as a tool. Solutions are aimed at business people, who have problem to solve. Tools are marketed to engineers/developers who have a solution to build.

The users of a solution, usually do not care about how it works or is implemented, as long as it solves the problem. However, the those of a tool are interested it maintaining the solutions they built using it.

When is cookie cutter good?

• Edmundo Lopez Bobeda, Ph.D.
• Date : March 10, 2022
• Categories : Language engineering
• Tags : Low code ,Thinking

One of the complaints I read the most about low-code tools or code generators in general is that they are too “cookie cutter”. I just made a google search to find the advantages and disadvantages of actual cookie cutters and I think they share some with low-code tools. Let us look at some desirable characteristics of cookie cutters:

• They easily cut complex details
• They are flexible enough to allow easy cleaning

Of course, the main attractive of cookie cutters is that they allow to make a certain cookie design in a very predictable, easy and reproducible way.

What is MDE?

• Edmundo Lopez Bobeda, Ph.D.
• Date : February 28, 2022
• Categories : Language engineering
• Tags : Mde ,Low code

In a previous post I presented what low-code is, and also pointed to a paper explaning the difference between low-code and MDE (Model-Driven Engineering). However, I have not presented what is MDE. In this post I want to correct that.

MDE is a well-studied subject, and there are definitions in academia. I will follow the definition given by David Ameller¹ and others. There is also the excellent site by Jordi Cabot that also gives a definition for these terms, you can find the relevant posts here and here.

Low-code development vs. MDE

• Edmundo Lopez Bobeda, Ph.D.
• Date : February 25, 2022
• Categories : Language engineering
• Tags : Mde ,Paper ,Low code

Today I want to share with you this excellent article about MDE (Model-Driven Engineering) and low-code platforms that I found through Twitter. The article is titled Low-code development and model-driven engineering: Two sides of the same coin?.

The paper explores the commonalities and differences of the two approaches and throws very good insights on the different concepts. I let you read it by yourself.

Let me know what you think!