The wave of “low-code” and “no-code” is sweeping over many companies. These solutions are used by both business users and professional developers. But the question arises as to how far low-code and no-code development can extend to large organizations, and at scale.
Gartner estimates that low-code tools will be ready to address all business needs within a year (but the analyst says nothing about no-code tools). By then, developers outside IT will make up at least 80% of the user base for low-code tools, up from 60% in 2021, Gartner analyst Mark Driver still predicts.
At the same time, the nature of low-code platforms is changing rapidly. A “hyperautomation feature” is expected to arrive in the next few years, he adds. In addition, there will be ever closer integration between low-code tools and software used by the trades.
These tools are suitable for small-scale initiatives
But not everyone sees every company getting excited about low-code and no-code solutions.
These tools are suitable for small-scale initiatives, says Steve Jones, DevOps specialist at Redgate Software. Low-code and no-code “are a good way to build small things as an initial way to set up apps that focus on one thing,” he says. “For example, someone may want to collect all vacation days in a calendar and display them to ensure that there are not too many people away at the same time. They may also want to create dashboards to track progress toward a goal.
Also, developers or CIOs should always keep a close eye on how low-code and no-code solutions are used. “While low-code and no-code solutions can be simple to use, their quality depends on the framework that supports them,” says Margaret Lee, chief executive of BMC. For a low-code solution to be successful, there must be governance in place and professional oversight to ensure the best possible customer experience.
The DSI may have to intervene to clean up the damage
In other words, without proper guidance and safeguards, IT departments may have to step in to clean up the mess, while business users may become entangled in managing their software.
Low-code and no-code are “useful in limited contexts, for narrow audiences,” says Jones. “However, IT should be prepared to take over these applications if they become important to the organization and require additional coding or rewriting,” he adds. “These applications may or may not scale, but they also become a distraction for business users. If an analyst is too involved in maintaining their low-code application, they are not performing their analyst duties well. We saw this in the 90s with VisualBasic, where many business users created small applications that they then had to maintain.
Clearly, low-code and no-code approaches could make their way into enterprises when adopted by professional developers themselves. As a rapid-deployment tool for IT professionals, “it’s possible to create very complex business processes elegantly without code,” Lee says. It can, for example, be a great way to introduce or improve DevOps practices, removing some of the low-value work and encouraging agility, experimentation, and learning. crew. This allows process owners to take ownership of their own process, while developers can focus their skills on augmenting out-of-the-box blocks with high-value custom blocks tailored to the needs of the organization.
The involvement of CIOs in building low-code and no-code applications depends on the complexity of the job
In the end, the direct involvement of CIOs in the creation of low-code and no-code applications depends on the complexity of the work. Business managers can build a “quick, goal-focused app,” says Jones.
“This can be built on top of something like Salesforce, using an API to get data, or a Power Platform app that collects data and stores it in a company database.”
IT help, however, becomes necessary “if the applications use internal infrastructure or internally controlled infrastructure, such as a company cloud subscription. They may also require a database, a network to operate. It is likely that they also require authorization to be installed on workstations”.
Source: “ZDNet.com”