Giving developers the tools to go further with Make
At Make, we’re driven by our purpose to help you work the way you imagine. As part of this, we’re always thinking of ways to maximize the value our users can unlock using Make.
While our visual no-code platform allows those with little to no development experience to automate processes and integrate applications in a way that transforms the way they work each day, it also has huge benefits for those with more robust development skills.
No-code benefits for developers
Where previously developers were building integrations and maintaining workflows for all parts of the business, with no-code, they can now scale their efforts, deploying new solutions to the business at record speed.
Beyond this, no-code platforms like Make also allow developers to benefit from faster prototyping, reduced development cycles, and more efficient collaboration with business teams. This not only accelerates project timelines but also allows you to quickly experiment and iterate on ideas, empowering you to drive greater value within your organization and stay ahead in a rapidly evolving tech landscape.
Challenges of developing for a no-code platform
Having said all this, we’re fully aware that developing within the no-code environment can also bring its own challenges.
As an example, developers often have concerns about using no-code platforms for automation due to perceived limitations in flexibility and customization. There can be question marks around the ability of no-code platforms to support complex logic or integrations needed for more advanced use cases.
Looking deeper, there are often challenges around collaboration in the testing and deployment of new integrations and systems. There can also be question marks around maintaining control with scale — and indeed whether no-code platforms have the power to scale at all.
New solutions for these challenges
In an effort to address these — and more — challenges, we’ve released a range of new solutions specifically designed for developers using Make.
Make DevTool
Earlier this year, we unveiled key improvements to Make DevTool that give developers the ability to debug their Make scenarios.
As part of this, an extra pane has been added to the Chrome Developer tools, enabling developers to review all manual scenario runs, performed operations and details of API calls performed. For improved app development, you can also view all the calls that an app has performed.
This extension aims to improve the developer experience by enabling faster, more seamless debugging across Make scenarios, modules, operations, apps, and more.
Local development for apps (beta)
In August, we also launched Local Development for Apps in beta in a new version of our Visual Studio Code extension, which enables developers to use Git versioning to develop custom apps.
With this update, we aim to empower you to work and collaborate more efficiently, iterate faster, and gain full control of changes, history, and deployment for your app — all without disrupting the live applications running in production.
Using our updated VS Studio Code extension, you can:
Clone and pull an application from Make into a local development environment.
Execute app iterations locally as well as deploy to either a test app or full production.
Review and compare code across Make and your local version.
Revert back to previous versions through syncing with Git.
Local Development for Apps has already been making a big impact with Maker users. Take Volodymyr Machula, an automation consultant who has been making great use of this functionality:
“I really like the Local Development for Apps feature in the VS Code extension. The most helpful aspect for me is the ability to store my app’s source code in GitHub. This small feature alone enables us to apply the Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) to building Make apps, which significantly enhances the development process. It facilitates version control, efficient team collaboration, and structured development practices, making it much easier to iterate on and maintain the app over time.”
Here’s a practical example of how Volodymyr’s team puts Local Development for Apps to work:
First, Volodymyr’s colleague Alice forks the main branch of the app in GitHub and creates a pull request with changes for the new module.
Alice tests the new module, and once it’s ready, she asks Bob to review and approve the changes.
Bob reviews the pull request and leaves comments on the code suggesting improvements.
Alice and Bob have a discussion in the pull request and decide that the change is necessary.
Alice makes the change and asks Bob to check again.
Everything now looks good, so Bob approves the pull request.
Once the new module is ready to be deployed:
Alice merges the pull request into the main branch.
Alice then deploys the new module using the VS Code plugin from Make and the Make control panel.
Without the Local Development for Apps feature, even this simple process wouldn’t be possible and would require significantly more effort. And this is just one of many processes it enables. As Volodymyr puts it, “I believe it’s a game changer for professional development teams.”
Get involved
Over 44% of Make apps are built and published by people outside of Make - vendors, partners and users. So there’s no better place to look for inspiration than our very own community of developers.
Why not visit the community area for app developers where you can read about or discuss all manner of topics related to custom app development in Make?
Or if you want to show off the best things you’ve built with Make, we have a space for that too.
