OpenText acquired BPM solution Metastorm in 2011, and has rebranded the product as OpenText MBPM. It is an alternative BPM solution to OpenText's primary BPM offering called OpenText Cordys Business Process Management.
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Power Apps
Score 8.1 out of 10
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PowerApps is a low code / rapid application development product from Microsoft that allows users to quickly build apps.
Metastorm is well-suited for scenarios in which internal stress testing an application is needed in a hurry before showcasing it to potential customers. It supports different views of the process from Swimlane perspective, so different methodologies can be handled. It is an Enterprise level tool and handles both small and large projects quite well, although smaller companies may be stressed out by the amount of time it takes to properly maintain the application.
PowerApps is well suited for "quick-wins" and fast prototypes of business solutions. It also is beneficial for situations where business partners and developers work together - it allows the business folks to provide a "quick-and-dirty" prototype which is then fleshed-out by developers that are trained experts on the platform. The interactive and easy to understand representation of the solution allows business partners to "see" the solution and add, remove, or correct aspects of it themselves. It provides a common view and understanding of the actual solution across business units and tech teams. PowerApps, being a low-code\no-code platform is not well suited for business processes that require many complex computations or large amounts of custom code - such as solutions that are better architected as Web Site or "full-blown" desktop solutions. There are solutions that are just not easy or quick to accomplish in a low-code\no-code platform. Enterprise Architects should know the difference, however business partners often try to create a solution and only when stuck because it becomes too complex do they engage a tech team for assistance - at which point there are sunk-costs involved and hinderences to re-platforming the solution
Power Apps has formats that are pre-built that don't require any coding which makes it easier to achieve your vision. This does become a challenge if your App needs don't fit into that format.
We deal with a ton of data so the fact that you can connect to any data source in addition to their pre-stablished data connections makes the process a breeze.
The online learning resources and tutorials are helpful as well for those who are tech savvy.
The Metastorm process engine is based on an older version of .NET. Updating to a newer version would resolve several known issues with .NET email functionality.
Metastorm builds web pages at run time. While the UI presented to the end user is fine, the Document Object Model is convoluted and subject to change with new releases. Providing a more simplified DOM or at very least a custom function to replace document.getElementById() would make client-side scripting a much more powerful tool.
One function that I've seen Metastorm competitors do well, is email wizards. Having a WYSIWYG email editor would be really nice.
PowerApps is a great solution and I have spent the last year familiarizing myself with the platform and building custom applications to complete a whole range of tasks such as asset management, custom invoice generation, and item restriction tracking. We as a company have barely begun to scratch the surface of what can be achieved with PowerApps.
The community forums are extremely responsive to questions asked, there is a good body of online documentation and many community posts to draw from. Although the platform has changed, which means some of the posts are out of date and the solutions provided aren't relevant. Of relevance, I read over 400 articles plus documentation to get this first app built in SharePoint, move it to SQL and make it work exactly the way it should.
We found that OpenText MBPM held its own quite well against IBM BPM. We ended up choosing OpenText MBPM due to the analytics, complex routing, and the ease of SOA service integration. Furthermore, the ability to quickly develop simple User interfaces make this tool a daily component of our most-used toolbox components.
Much cheaper, much more customizable, and easier to use. There is not much of a learning curve and the licensing cost is much cheaper. PowerApps does one thing very well, whereas other platforms are mediocre. There is much more customization possible for your in-house workflows that you can build yourself vs using NetSuite engineers to build it for you.
It has given us a focal point for development. We now have the possibility of connecting to mobile and the default SharePoint online interface isn't always easy to manipulate. PowerApps has given us an opportunity to improve our user experience.
An improved user experience has given us a better shot at compliance. When users don't fight the environment, they don't gravitate towards workarounds or non-compliance.
As lists and libraries change, the platform scales pretty well.
Having users with the capability to create their own forms and tools has dialed back the app dev need (there is a balance though) and distributed power to the process architects and people who actually need the solutions in the first place—much more efficient model of service delivery: self-service.
