Application Development Managers Know: Less is More

Application Development Managers Know that Sometimes Less is More

Is the development team working on your RIA client different from the team working on your core business application logic? Do you ever have bottlenecks in development caused by lack of the right people with the right skills? Have you ever felt overly dependent on skill specialists?

Experienced application development managers know that sometimes less is more. Unfortunately, with the most well-known RIA solutions, a condition known as “deviated development” occurs. A team of RIA programmers is writing code in a completely different line-by-line scripting language that the back-end team. Would you intentionally invent this scenario? Of course not. When it comes to programming language diversity, less is definitely more. But some enterprises just feel trapped, bogged down by risk-prone strategies that have evolved over time.

With the uniPaaS application platform, organizations do not need to invest in multiple specialized skill sets in order to develop modern RIA applications as well as traditional client-server applications. They just need to describe the functionality of the application and request it's execution as needed - RIA or Client-Server. This reduces the cost and requirements of development resources.



A good analogy is the universal remote control - you use the same on/off, channel or volume buttons on the remote regardless of which equipment you operate.
In uniPaaS, the main Metadata elements are: Business Logic, Data View Definition, and Basic Operations: Update, Call (internal), Invoke (External), Raise Event, Evaluate, Verify, Form (Input or Output), Expressions (uniPaaS programs can access around 400 built-in functions as well as custom functions created by your developers) . uniPaaS is declarative programming at its best. The programmer states what he wants to do without coding the minutiae of how it is to be done. The uniPaaS application platform knows how to do that – across multiple platforms and databases. Metadata Isolates the physical environment (hardware, operating system, database, communication layers, etc.) from the business logic of your application.

In uniPaaS applications, there are many common application features, such as security, data access, user interaction, that can be 'invoked' rather than 'developed' each time. A distinctive example is the 'Recompute' feature of uniPaaS. This works a little bit like a spreadsheet - it maintains dependencies that only need to be defined once, throughout the entire application.

Maintenance of those pre-programmed components is assured. When trying to do the same in Java with acquired classes, the furture maintenance of those opaque pieces becomes a serious hurdle.

Take the example of an inventory item and a Sales form. In traditional programming, the developer would have to program the incrementation or decrementation of the quantity in stock for each edit of the sales form line (create the line, delete the line, modify the line). In uniPaaS, all the developer has to do is to write a rule that defines how the sales quantity relates to the quantity in stock (typically "sales quantity decrements stock quantity"), and uniPaaS will automatically handle all the individual cases. Other typical examples can be found in the handling of the User Interface or Data Access.

In today's dynamic business environment, application development team leaders are looking for simplicity - they are interested in reducing the diversity level in their team, eliminating repetitive or mechanical tasks, saving time and resources, and attempting to work with the platforms that provide solutions for both client and server sides of the same business application.

In addition considering the fact that good programmers are scarce, there is a need to work with one platform that will cater to all flavors and business requirements such as Web Services, XML, team development, mobile development, Web programming and more.

uniPaaS and, if needed, Magic Software's professional services team can answer all the requirements through the use of one consolidated environment for development and deployment, combined with expert level consulting, support and hand-holding services.

Why stack up a bunch of old remote controls on your desk along with soon-to-be archaic RIA programming skill sets. Focus on a unitary application development approach that is metadata driven and flexible across multiple environments.

For a FREE! White Paper, please see Business Applications: Building a User Interface to Deliver Optimal User Experience