Sep. 17, 2023
Read time: 2 minutes and 40 seconds.
tags:I’m one to talk, because I think my first response was like, “Woah, no-code?? More like no thanks.”
No-code tools seemed like a joke, but it’s actually awesome. As developers, setting up infrastructure is a pain. No-code lets you skip that and prototype rapidly. think about the awesome experience of your face hitting the keyboard as you try to authenticate with some type of token only to realize your redirect was unmatched. or something else that’s trivial but annoying.
No-code removes the massive headache of setting up infrastructure and dealing with authentication, for example. Imagine having to integrate three or four different systems to get something like a text file into a telegram bot from your Google Drive. Instead, you can just connect simple modules with actions and prove out the theory around the automation instead of spending all of your time developing a solution that may not pan out.
It’s not about not being able to code it, but more about diminishing returns. How often do you have to develop a solution and go through the hassle of finally deploying something only to have it go stale and unused? And then from there, how much time did you spend to achieve that?
We are talking about how you can quickly test ideas and products without getting bogged down in custom software development. You don’t have to spend the eight hours or ten hours thumbing through documentation when you just want to connect a few apps and make it happen in the cloud.
No need for CI/CD, provisioning servers or handling containers when a lot of these things can live in a no-code instance quickly to solve your problem.
A development background gives you a huge edge when it comes to technology, especially if you’re familiar with handling data structures. You can handle complex tasks, like mapping and arrays, more efficiently than people who might not be familiar with how these data types might work. And you will inevitably see more of these tools come up as AI and automation are being married one with the other to achieve these things.
If you can relinquish your ego when it comes to development and coding, you have a huge opportunity to make some major moves in your development game when you know there are certain things that are better left temporarily handled by an external service. I say this with a few tools I have made where I will deploy a certain backend service or API and find that I can easily integrate other notification tools without having to worry about interface or front end. Instead, I focus on the problem i’m solving and keep the tools which are masters at keeping people engaged allow me to make a push, publish or call. It’s especially useful for backend developers, and if you really want to get particular about it, there are opensource versions you can run locally on your machine where you have full control.
I personally don’t care and make my computer work quite a bit already so a little relief with some heavy data stuff in the cloud is fine by me. So I have make.com which is better than one might think. I recommend it, but there’s n8n, zapier, and a whole bunch of other tools that exist to make your life easier.
But the real question is: do you want your development life to be easier? Well, do ya?