It’s easier than ever to create software applications, like websites or project trackers, without writing a single line of code.

Those on the ground — who are in the arena — are designing solutions for their community’s problems with some internet sense and a desire to create a better way of doing things. It’s the rise of arts & crafts or a return to vernacular architecture where the maker generation can use the building blocks of the digital age with all the complexities of servers, protocols, and code humming in the background.

While each no code platform will have different building blocks and strengths, they all tend to have the following 4 components: Building software applications without code - Internet / interface/ interaction , Building software applications without code - Data flows , Building software applications without code - Living development environment , and Building software applications without code - Community .

Internet / interface/ interaction

Many no-code tools allow you to design your content in a compelling visual, accessible to anyone on the world wide web.

Content: How do you create and spread great ideas? The most effective ideas are shared through artifacts like the written word, pictures, video, audio, and diagrams. From the Constitution to the latest TikTok remix, humans have found all sorts of mediums to get their points across. No-code tools allow users to drop whatever they want onto the canvas and arrange it for any device. This flexible canvas is commonly referred to as WYSIWYG (What you see is what you get), which differs from having to code the structure and then pass through the content when rendering it later. Visual development like this is way easier and more accessible.

Interaction: Beyond static 1-way content, we enter Web 2.0, where there is dynamic interaction between the application and users. This includes 2-way affordance like:

• Buttons that take action such as sending emails and adding content.
• Controls where users can adjust settings or dynamically change visuals.
• Reactions such as the social media staple of liking, forms for entering information.

2-way content — information and visuals where users can interact and have conversations and build community with each other — is more engaging and creates more value (user-generated content platforms like Twitter > 1st-party content like a static newspaper).

Data flows

Most applications give users the ability to create, read, update, and delete data (CRUD) and many no-code tools allow you to do this without having to understand this concept in detail.

Databases: No-code tools either integrate with — or have built-in — relational database that you can directly interact with.

You may be wondering why a RDBM matters. “I have a spreadsheet, isn’t that enough?”In a social media app like Twitter, behind the scenes, there are a bunch of connected tables that hold information, such as a user table with all the user information and a tweet table that associates the tweet with who said it (the user table). Likewise, in business operations, a project may connect to a team, a contact to a company, or a goal to monthly metric updates. Without these relations, data because one-dimensional, siloed, and impossible to query easily (or at all).

Integrations: Most modern applications talk with each other to increase their utility. Have you ever used your Gmail or social media login for a new service? Behind the scenes, even apps like weather.com connect to a data source that the product developers don’t create or own. Applications talk with each other through an API (Application Programming Interface), and no-code tools offer the ability to connect your app with other apps to increase the value of your service.

Take actions: No-code tools provide some sort of programming “language” where you can tell the tool what to do for you: query data, automate tasks, calculate, and do things through logic. They come in two flavors, and most tools include both:

• Visual builders: Drag and drop mixed with connectors or form-like experiences guide you in building some sort of structure or chain of commands “When something happens, then do this.” For example “When you change the status to Complete message the project team.” This is sometimes called visual programming.
• Formulas: Many no-code makers say that Excel is the most popular no-code tool (even though the company that created Excel doesn’t call it that!). A key part of any application is to calculate and many pull from the same list of formulas popularized by spreadsheets like If() and Sum().

Living development environment

No-code tools lower the barrier to getting your MVP / Prototype out to your team or generally available in the market: the investment and value realization gets closer, the loop between product feature launches and user feedback gets tighter, and innovation cycles spin faster.

Where you build the app influences the time it takes to launch, and for no-code, the application building and launching interface is usually in the same place, making it simpler to create and easier to collaborate in. For coders, the closest example is the IDE (Integrated Development Environment) which bundles most aspects of development to production workflows.

Community

When investing in a no-code tool, we want a thriving community of makers who are passionate about creating solutions, warmly invite newcomers, and serve each other by openly sharing progress and challenges. This collaborative ethos is seen in the broader no-code community. A good example is #buildinpublic.

• Forum for connecting. Like Stack Overflow for developers, no-code tools create shared spaces to have conversations whether it’s using a tool-moderated platform like Discourse such as community.coda.io, or more casual interactions on Discord, Slack, Reddit, Twitter, or YouTube.
• Open source: The early tech companies like IBM, Xerox, and SAP were closed source; they innovated internally and never shared their intellectual property. Then came new communities who openly shared what they were building on social code sharing sites like Github — Google and Amazon would build on that stack. Instead of keeping the new versions to themselves, they would share back, creating a flywheel of value and collaboration. The same is happening in no-code with folks openly sharing templates, hacks, and solutions.

In conclusion.

No-code tools are growing like crazy: there have never been so many options for creating your own applications for business, small team, or personally. With the proliferation of these tools, finding the right platform to invest time and money is harder. Determine your needs and how they fit into the four core areas of a no-code tool — interfaces, data, development environment, and community — and you’ll find the right fit.

Repurposed for Coda here: https://coda.io/@solutions/how-to-build-web-applications-without-code