Happy Friday,

Nothing like meetings before 9 AM to throw off your day.

I always have some idea I want to try out for a business or product. Sometimes I take it seriously and validate that idea through interviews and formal experiments. Sometimes I don't take it seriously and see what I can knock together quickly.

Sadly when I get around to putting something together, my background in development is as much a curse as it is a benefit.

I know I can build whatever solution I want, but I also know it will take a while, and it may not be the best use of my time either. So that has led me down a path of learning more and more about what options exist to prototype a working product without the need for me to code.

This is what the no-code hype is all about.

Now, I'm currently looking through which tools I'd like to use to do a prototype for one of my ideas, and I'm not here to review them, but I do want to explain what is going through my mind when I'm looking at these options.

Honestly, one of the first things I look at is price. I'm a natural saver, so I don't part with money easily. Most of these tools run $30 a month or so, but if you need 5 of them, that is $150 a month to attempt to get to market.

Next, I look at what the product's core capability is. I don't really worry about all the things they say the product can be used for, I want to know what it is actually designed to do. The further I get from the core capability, the harder it will be for my particular case to work smoothly.

Then, I look at integrations. Many no-code tools integrate with many of the other ones, but you have to check, or else you'll be building some integration code or paying more for something like Zapier.

I then consider the learning curve for each tool. Most of them look so darn easy and friendly, but there are going to be parts that are maddingly difficult to handle. How quickly will I be able to leverage 5 different tools compared to building one or two myself?

Last I consider replacement and disaster. I can conceptually get to market with a combination of no-code solutions, but there is a point when it stops making sense to operate that way. I want to think about which parts make sense to replace and how easy or hard it will be. I'm also concerned about how I'll debug and solve problems. This is especially true if it relates to customer/user information and financial transactions. Who do I call for help, or how do I find out where the break happened?

I think no-code solutions are a pretty interesting thing to learn about right now. I don't think it will replace software development in any meaningful way for the next few years, but I do think it's sweet spot is for proofs-of-concept work, MVPs, and entrepreneurs.

If you've had experience with no-code solutions, I'd love to hear more about it. Just reply and tell me what happened!

Here's my weekly update for July 29th, 2022...

🗒️ Quality Last Is a Stupid Strategy

Today I’m going to rant a little bit because I’m over-caffeinated, and a few things have come up all related to quality and testing.

Click here to read more

🗒️ How To Break Work Down

There is a lot that I can say about the magic of breaking work down into workable chunks, but I want to focus on one particular lens in this article.

Click here to read more

Enjoy,

Ryan Latta