Alpha Anywhere vs. Moovweb XDN

The speed of development from concept, through development and delivery of the end product is so impressive [with Alpha Anywhere]. There is an impressive array of genies and helper functions meaning that you can focus on what matters, the end user experience. It is not a "No code" solution but it is a very impressive "low code" solution which allows detailed access under the hood to tweak the applications to your own needs and the needs of your clients.

It depends on who you are. If you are very small it won't be worth the money. If you have a very cranky site with nested tables coming out of every orifice, maybe you should look at a replatform or desktop rewrite first. If you have a site with vast numbers of custom content pages, it will work but may not be cost effective. Moovweb is well suited to you if you need the ability to control mobile experiences and respond to changes in mobile and the demands of mobile aware executives who want to move more quickly than your current IT processes allow. It is well suited if you need something quickly but also want the option to bring mobile development and support in-house some time in the next year or two (which you should). It is well suited if your desire to improve a responsive experience has been thwarted by internal fears over the impact that it might have on desktop. It is well suited if you want to experiment on mobile but do more than just change the color of a button or make a font larger. It's very good at letting a UX team try things out and see what real customers do.

• Our company had been creating small business applications since the 1980's, when we used DBase IV (don't laugh... that's what was available). Then, we got more "sophisticated" with Microsoft Access. Clearly, we would always be limited with what we can do with those two programs. By accident, during an Internet search, we saw and ad for Alpha Anywhere (back then, it was called Alpha V). After working with the 30 free trial for just two weeks, we retired Access, for good. The best part was Alpha's flexibility in its use of "back end" data tables. That allowed us to use existing Access tables as we redesigned the front-end program (Alpha ships with its own DBF system, but we prefer SQL-Based tables). You can choose, SQL Server, MySQL, Oracle, Access, Paradox (actually, too many to name) for your tables. You can even create links to Excel spreadsheets or QuickBooks Tables. It's outstanding!
• Alpha allows developers to create very large and very complex programs. However, it's also a great choice for RAD (Rapid Application Development) for those who need to be up and running quickly or for less experienced programmers. Actually, the interface truly allows for "codeless" development of your application (more on that later). That means you can design a fully functional application, without typing a single line of code. They have some examples on their website.
• My favorite part of Alpha is that it is constantly adding features and functions that allow us to do more with our applications. In fact, one of my biggest problems is that I need more time to learn and practice the added features as fast as they are introduced
• Prior to Alpha Anywhere, we never considered creating/developing "mobile" applications (for tablets, smartphones, etc.). Alpha created a unique "panel" system that makes those application work great... and allows for the design of very sophisticated Apps.

Incentivized

• Moovweb takes the time to really understand your needs and challenges and is willing to work with and address them. They are partners during and AFTER implementation.
• Moovweb and their implementation partner 64Labs has a fantastic response time and work ethic. They really will do what it takes.
• Moovweb takes the time to share their product road map with customers.

Incentivized

• I really enjoyed product when the database was a part of it, less maintenance
• Converting to the cloud has been challenging
• Security setup should be simpler, like Softr or Stacker

• Depending on how your site is built and maintained, there may be a different solution that will be a better option for your business and customer needs.
• At the end of the day, this is another layer that is added to your development plan and time to ensure updates work across multiple devices. Moovweb is really good about the turn-time for these updates, but there still needs to be the added QA step for M&T optimization per release.

Personally as a Mobile Architect I am a huge proponent of building mobile-first responsive websites. I will always fight for a lobby for businesses to build sites with all devices in mind and not focus their attention on desktop driven sites which are then adaptively scaled to meet the demands of the business, in my opinion leading to a never ending cycle of building separate media queries to compensate for every device the business chooses to market to

Incentivized

Good set of customer success people combined with the flexibility to use high-quality onshore partners if workload increases at busy times. I think Moovweb's support efforts are pretty solid.

1. Don't spend weeks in design. Because of the way the technology works nuances of design can change very quickly further down the line. We have changed the look of the product list for a client a week before launch.
2. Push for getting the project into UAT within four weeks of the kickoff of the project. There are few retailer projects that need to take more than that. In my experience the more concentrated the timeline the more effective the implementation.
3. Check that there are no major changes planned on desktop during the time of your implementation (another reason to keep the development to four weeks).
4. If you have custom mobile content requirements, get them to your implementer at the start. Moovweb is great at heavy-lifting existing content, but your implementer will need to recommend solutions for custom content that will need to be tested. Get these requirements out at the start.
5. Make a list of your desktop plugins. Moovweb can handle them all, but they can be handled in different ways
6. If you have Paypal/Google Wallet and want it on mobile as part of your project, talk about that early on.

Alpha Anywhere is a full-stack IDE. It’s no code and low code, but you can also custom code if you need to. About 10% of our application is no code. 80% is low code and 10% is custom code.

This is the only mobile technology we have used. We went through an extensive research and vetting process. In the end Moovweb was the best choice for technology and business needs. We considered the following companies: Moovweb,Mobify, Usablenet, Mad Mobile, SKAVA, Wompmobile. Forrester has a mobile infrastrucutre services report that could be very helpful.

Incentivized

• Allows for a great return on investment since you can quickly become very productive and complete more projects and applications in a shorter period of time with hand coding and the normal programming headaches of PHP, C#, Angular, etc.
• You can afford to take on more and smaller projects since they will require far less time to complete than more traditional development environments.
• Alpha Anywhere is continuously updated coming out with new features and capabilities on essentially a daily basis. Continuous improvement and frequent updates allows you to always stay ahead of the curve and competitors.
• Alpha Anywhere allows you to offer lower cost solutions that will be completed in less time and that will be much easier to support and maintain.

Incentivized

• The implementation was 4 months from start to finish. Mobile is about 10% of our visits today and our mobile revenue for the first half is about $200K so we will have a payback in 1 -2 years.
• Moovweb is not the most economical solution out there. It is one of the most comprehensive for sites needing all their content available for mobile.