Creation at the speed of ideas
September 27, 2016
Creation at the speed of ideas
Score 10 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with Mendix App Platform
At Mansystems we use Mendix as the platform of choice to deliver solutions to our customers. Six years ago, a team of three people including myself rebuilt our service management solution, ExpertDesk completely in Mendix. In three months we had the basics and in nine months we were ready to go to market. After this period we sold and implemented ExpertDesk a lot. To support ExpertDesk better we developed tooling for the Mendix platform. Using our experience we also started doing Mendix projects other than ExpertDesk.
At this point in time Mendix is selling our automated testing solution (ATS) and our application performance monitor and we are developing those tools further together with Mendix.
And we have a healthy professional services business around Mendix.
At this point in time Mendix is selling our automated testing solution (ATS) and our application performance monitor and we are developing those tools further together with Mendix.
And we have a healthy professional services business around Mendix.
- Mendix takes care of everything from creation to delivery and support. A full loop. Not many people comprehend the impact of using a platform that covers model driven design, single click deployment, browser, tablet and mobile, scrum support, automated testing, monitoring and feedback loop.
- Mendix helps creating applications in all kinds of manners. From templates, an AppStore, standard integration points to demanding consistency with the error checker that with a double click brings you to the place of the error
- Mendix is open. That means you can extend the platform in all layers. For the client you can develop widgets and leverage the full potential of the browser or mobile device. On the server you can write java or use web services, rest services or even built in AppServices to design a Mendix component based ecosystem. The is also a model SDK to write tooling and automate anything you can model by hand.
- Mendix is easy to use. It uses visual models for data (domain models), logic (flows) and screens. Mendix has extended documentation, a very active community with a forum and a developer portal, a large set of blogs, video's to support new users, a training program.
- With creation and automated testing covered, I recommend them addressing documentation ease. They could design a hyperlink based system into versions of the model, so you could use a kind of CMS to manage business app documentation and present it in a structured way.
- The sprintr (agile/scrum) solution could be enhanced to better support assigning tasks to users and manage per user stuff like capacity
- With Mendix we can develop solutions at least 6 times faster. These are medium to large sized enterprise grade solutions that need good security, good performance, good testability.
- We developed tools to automate testing in Mendix and do performance monitoring in Mendix and that helped our business further
- You can leverage on consultants that do not have hard programming skills to be very good business consultants and use the Mendix modeler. This gets you closer to the customer and delivers great solutions. Off course you can arrange a specialist when needed, but most work can be done by what you call citizen developers
We used to use BMC Remedy ARS as a solution platform. Mendix was better on most parts that are important to us: ease of use, visual modeling, consistency, price, cloud, mobile devices, AppStore, widgets, the list goes on.
Using Mendix App Platform
40 - Consultants, support, developers, administration
Evaluating Mendix App Platform and Competitors
Yes - BMC Remedy ARS was replaced, because developing in Mendix is a lot faster, the platform is a lot more complete. It's cloud based. Supports mobile.
- Price
- Product Features
- Product Usability
We value the ability of citizen developers and thus less technical business consultants to model solutions for the customer. This bridges the gap between business and IT. This leverages on people we other skills, especially in knowing your customer and understanding their business domain.
The seamless deployment and full life cycle support from requirements, development, test, acceptance, production, feedback in a agile way is really helping us to deliver fast.
The seamless deployment and full life cycle support from requirements, development, test, acceptance, production, feedback in a agile way is really helping us to deliver fast.
Mendix turns out to have a very active community and great support. We should have included that in the selection as well.
Mendix App Platform Support
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Quick Resolution Good followup Knowledgeable team Problems get solved Kept well informed No escalation required Immediate help available Support understands my problem Support cares about my success Quick Initial Response | None |
Yes - I've reported multiple bugs. If high impact it is solved as fast as possible. If low impact they will nicely communicate when to expect the solution.
What i find really exceptional is when feature requests are picked up and become part of the solution. In the past I had a time saving feature when setting permissions to individual attributes. This time saver was implemented and saved me a lot of time!!
Last year the started with the idea forum where the community can vote on ideas. They implement the top ideas.
Last year the started with the idea forum where the community can vote on ideas. They implement the top ideas.
Using Mendix App Platform
| Pros | Cons |
|---|---|
Like to use Relatively simple Easy to use Technical support not required Well integrated Consistent Quick to learn Convenient Feel confident using Familiar | None |
- Graphical flow charts for business flow functionality, for GUI flows, for event handlers, for anything that is a flow.
- Develop in the same platform for browser, mobile and tablet
- Consistency checks help me to refactor fast and often and hence iterate well in an agile manner
- Reporting is mostly done with additions from the AppStore. The integrated graphical reporting is too limited.
- PDF templating is also mostly done with additions from the AppStore. The integrated PDF templates lack a few often needs features like including dynamic graphs from reports.
Yes - Really well. You can reuse most of what you developed already. You can additionally design specific mobile screens. Mendix supports an offline database and custom widgets on mobile.