Is No-Code (or Low-Code) the Future of Development

In this video, you'll learn whether or not you should worry about no-code or low-code solutions taking your job as a developer or freelancer. I'll also share my thoughts on some of the solutions that are out there and if it's something you should experiment with too.

Intro: 00:00
Viewer’s question: 00:38
What is No-Code and Low-Code: 00:55
Where do we go from here?: 05:33
No-Code solutions: 09:00
The Cons of No-Code:15:30

#nocode #lowcode #freelancing

[knofal]

Great points! The evolution of WordPress always comes to my mind when I hear no-code-low-code. At some point 10-15 years ago I thought that will kill my simple web design business but actually it did help businesses as you mentioned proof the idea faster at lower cost and allowed a lower entry point for businesses to have a website (then). Moving forward now we have "WordPress Developers".

[mrrymrri]

Donn - good video. Being a professional software developer today is not about writing within a programming language, and writing code is not the most crucial part of the job. Software development is mostly about the stack, the platforms, data sources, databases, network layers, APIs, security mechanisms and procedures that you use to build software solutions. Meaning anything you can do faster is a win.

[cherriepie]

They use low code where I work, but I personally I don't like it because it doesn't allow fine tuning that are required in doing certain tasks. Simple things such as getting the value from a drop down list is sooo needlessly convoluted, I find it way easier to do this through code.

I think the future should be a hybrid of both code and no code, a benefit of low code is that there is less risk of vulnerabilities because of poor code, and the backend is automatically connected and handled for you, you are also able to deploy applications instantly and run them on any device which is massively useful.

If low code is the future, we should embrace it, but there should be a way to allow developers to utilise their skills in code to fine tune things, there should always be room for fine tuning for those who already have experience with development, whereas those who aren't experienced are still able to benefit.

[rajakarim]

Thank you Donn for a great explanation

[scotttang]

woah, fantastic discussion! Thanks for sharing

[paulminshall]

My worry is that managers are getting sold on the idea of using non developers for churning out critical production apps. I’m probably going to get roped into fixing the mess, much like what already happens with the ‘unofficial’ Access databases being written by end users.

[waylengaming]

I don't like the typing noise in the background. But everything else was wonderfully executed. Good job on the vid. It was very helpful to me :).

[cjtay]

We still need coders to use no code solutions. There is no way for someone without any basic understanding of HTML structure to understand what is a Container in Webflow or Wix

[cirtey]

Low code-only valid use case is a fast prototype. Cannot be used for prod. Hard to debug, has no community compared to programming, is nonscalable, and is hard to customize and extend. Having a small community is the biggest hurdle as AI does not have a large enough dataset to train on, so exit copilot, chatgpt, and its predecessors.

[darshanv]

Hi Donn, I was wanting to know what you think about Unqork? I would really love to see a video about it.

[alisonseah]

Hi Donn, you'd mentioned that you ran a Training site on no code for 6 years, may i know if it is a Website or a Webapp? Where did you host it on? On web-hosting services like BlueHost, Hostgator or one of those Cloud services like AWS or GCP? Thx for answering, as i am quite confused as to which way to pursue new business, as in, a website or webapp....Thx:)

[PPPEARN]

Very informative video! How about Outsystem vs Mendix? What are your thoughts, if any? Thanks

[wrongturn_w]

One big con with low-code specifically, is the development environment. Usually no testing, no code navigation, no documentation quick-view, basic autocomplete, and few keyboard shortcusts. And then there‘s latency!

[ruirodrigues]

I still find work with VBA/Access, especialy VBA, companies love their excel macros

[DaDaBIK]

Thanks for the video. I might be biased, being the founder of one of the very first low-code no-code platform for Web applications. About the future of these platforms, I want to add a simple observation: starting from the 80s, we have seen a constant trend in software development: adding more and more levels of abstraction; the low-code no-code trend is adding yet another level of abstraction and I don't think we'll go back.

About integration and the limits of these platforms, you made good points; I would stress the fact that integration and possibilities to add features/customize with additional code change a lot from platform to platform. In dadabik for example you can add hooks in pure PHP, so any PHP programmer can do it without having to learn additional languages.


Where the final application must be hosted is another point to consider: does the platform provide an on-premises solution so you can host (and move) your app and db anywhere or you are forced to use their cloud? This can make a lot of difference e.g. if you have direct access to the database the platform is using you have much more options in terms of integration and tuning.

[yesamen]

I'm web developer, front and Back!! Is this how it's going to be? 😳 Scary!!

[GinoZambe]

Totally agree. It has it's disadvantages but alot of advantages

I've used no code tools for some time now with my own consulting/freelance builder.

I used to code websites but with all the tools available I decided to move more towards a "marketing person" than a "developer person".

[gayu]

I was hired as a full stack developer to build solutions using low code tools....Even though I like the Business solutions being built but I feel my skills of being a Full stack developer is getting useless love for programming is still there and I don't know how to get back into my interest.

[thearchibaldtuttle]

While my developers are open minded and understand that our puropse is to solve business problems, there is some hesitation and comments "I'm not a SW Engineer to drag and drop boxes around". I cannot see my highly skilled and qualified SW Engineers to work with it, without feeling degraded. If business thinks they want to do it themselves, I'm happy to leave this field to them. Entirely! There is enough important work that requires skills and capabilites that business cannot provide.

[GumbyTheGreen]

14:33 - "5 figures a MONTH". 14:55 - "5 figures a YEAR". Which is it?