HACKER Q&A
📣 notadev

Any resources for developing low-code/no-code tools?


When googling for any tutorials or resources for creating low-code/no-code tools, it seems like all results are how to use low/no-code tools to create apps, but not how to create these tools themselves.

Just giving it some thought, I would assume it's some JavaScript drag-and-drop functionality for the user interface and converting selected components to pre-defined functions? I understand that's an over-simplification, so I'm looking for a better source to really understand everything involved. Can anyone provide any links?

  👤 dolni Accepted Answer ✓
This isn't an answer to your question, and I apologize for that. But I have a tangential question of my own: what is the motivation driving the creation of "no code" tools?

I don't mean simple graphical editors for workflows with a very defined scope. I refer more to things like Amazon Honeycomb.

As I see it, the sort of apps you could reasonably create with no code solutions can be purchased off the shelf and offer way more features. And you don't need to do your own bug squashing.

And if you really _do_ need custom functionality, a no code solution is painting you into a corner. At some point your app will grow beyond what can be accomplished with these basic tools. Now you need to scrap the whole thing and rebuild from zero in a real programming language.

That's how it roughly plays out in my mind, anyway. Anybody see one of these "no code" apps deployed in a sensible context before?