Top Complaints for Low-Code Platforms and How Contextual Makes It Better

The attraction of low-code platforms is obvious:

• Faster Development: Low-code platforms allow users to build applications more quickly by minimizing manual coding. Pre-built templates, drag-and-drop interfaces, and automation help reduce development time, enabling faster delivery of applications.

• Cost Efficiency: By reducing the need for specialized developers and lengthy development cycles, low-code platforms can lower costs. Businesses can save on hiring additional coding experts and still develop complex applications with smaller teams.

• Accessibility for Non-Developers: Low-code platforms empower business users or "citizen developers" who lack deep coding skills to participate in the development process. This democratizes application development, enabling more team members to contribute and create solutions that meet specific business needs.

BUT the reality of existing low-code platforms (Appian, OutSystems, Mendix, Decisions) can be far less ….. desirable …. when reality sets in.

Here are 3 top complaints levied against low-code platforms—like those listed above—and how Contextual is disrupting the industry by delivering exactly what real users want.

Unfair Complexity

For many platforms, low-code doesn’t mean you don’t need specialists. The unique development approaches that the platforms employ, from how they describe their data structures to custom languages for writing business logic, require you end up dependent on a different category of ‘developer’. These developers have to be experts in the unique approach, model, and technical uniqueness of the platform itself. While visual editors might make it possible to ‘see’ your software, they certainly don’t make it possible for the average business analyst or non-technical user to easily build and make changes to that software.

Contextual is built on industry standards, including JSON Schema for defining your data objects and Node-RED’s open-source visual editor + Javascript for business logic. That means any developer or technical resource in your organization can be immediately successful in building on the platform with no learning curve or ramp-up period required. It also means bringing new resources into an engagement or transferring responsibility between team members is a breeze.

Unfair Lock-In

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While you want to believe your data is your data and your business logic is your business logic—in many low-code platforms that couldn’t be further from the truth. As soon as you start building, you’re locked in. The data structures in place to capture your business data are proprietary and not easily exported or transferred into another platform or system. The business logic you so painstakingly created, well, that will only run on that one specific platform and can’t easily be ported elsewhere. You’d have to start from scratch. It’s a one-way door and then a labyrinth from which you cannot escape.

With Contextual, we want you to WANT to keep building on the platform. We don’t set up arbitrary gates and hurdles to keep you stuck. Want to extract your data schemas and all your data? No problem. You can do that manually or programmatically through Contextual’s out-of-the-box API. Want to port your logic to another platform? Contextual’s open-source Node-RED and javascript languages make transfer simple. Of course, we want you to stay and keep creating, but we want to earn your ongoing commitment, not trap you into it.

Unfair Pricing

You don’t have to look much beyond OutSystems’ pricing to know that these are not solutions for the cost-conscious. By charging companies per user, per application, and for any number of add-ons, costs on existing platforms start high and skyrocket. Managing the ROI of your digital transformation or AI innovation is made exceptionally difficult when the ‘I’ (Investment) is already through the roof.

Appian likes to hide their pricing (for obvious reasons). You can read about it here though. Spendy.

Want to build a solution on Contextual? You can start for free. Want to set a solution live? Compute to run your solution starts at just pennies an hour. We believe massive price tags tied to users, individual apps, or threshold events that mean you’re getting real value are unfair. You should be able to start small and scale according to your need. Scale your application or system and scale your costs.

If you’re ready to free yourself from the unfair realities of today’s low-code business process automation and workflow automation platforms, look no further. Contextual turns the table on unfair practices.

Learn more in the Product Overview or reach out for a demo.