Openkoda

Open-source platform for faster business app development

Productivity

Open Source

Developer Tools

Artificial Intelligence

Tech

Development

Hi friends, We are Michal & Arek, and we have just recently published our first open-source release of Openkoda, an open-source low-code platform for the rapid development of SaaS and enterprise applications. Quick demo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gob4j072Isg Our story is rather straightforward. We met at the university and spent the last 20 years building high-performance applications for finance, eCommerce, travel, and healthcare sectors, working in different companies. Then, we catered to various clients as we started our own software company 10 years ago. Over the years, we also started building our own products like Recostream (AI/ML Personalized Recommendation Engine for eCommerce, acquired last year) and ScanRepeat (Continuous Web Security Scanner). We noticed that enterprise applications have a lot of common logic, such as role-based security, audit trails, dashboards, multi-tenancy, etc., which we had to re-implement almost every single time in different configurations. At some point, we realized that by compiling all these lessons, we could build a solid and proven foundation for creating SaaS and enterprise applications. We added a few more fancy features to help us build our own products, JS-based low-code running on JDK, AI Companion for quick generation of functional extensions, Stripe payments, integrations with Slack, Teams, GitHub, Trello, and Basecamp, etc. And that’s how Openkoda was born. See more: https://github.com/openkoda/open... Openkoda is based on modern Java and Spring Boot, as it is still the primary choice in enterprise firms, probably due to its mature ecosystem and large talent pool. We decided to release it under a dual-license model (core features under the MIT open-source license, selected enterprise features like AI Companion under a commercial license). Why Openkoda? We believe that building large-scale SaaS and enterprise applications should be easier and faster. Easier, so we don't need to reinvent the "enterprise wheel" every single time, introducing the same bugs with new teams. Faster, as the real business value of our applications is not in these "enterprise features," but in the actual application logic. Enterprise features are just the required coating to run this logic in a controlled, sustainable way. We experienced increased velocity on our own, building RecoStream (3 months to build a working product) and ScanRepeat (5 months to build a working product). We also executed a mental exercise to estimate development effort to build an enterprise-ready MVP with key features of some well-known applications like Harvest, Trello, Calendly, Notion, and Buffer and came up with savings varying between 60-70%, which is natural when you build the key logic only, and the rest is provided by the platform. When looking for time/cost savings in enterprise software development, the first idea is usually to use low-code/no-code solutions, but as engineers, we all understand the "low-code trap." The "low-code trap" implies that by investing two-three years of your time building a custom solution for your business in a low-code environment, you become fully dependent on the vendor. You become a victim of the notorious user-based pricing and other non-scalable commercial terms. You also discover that your key application logic tends to land in the "Custom Code" box that any low-code/no-code platform has, which ultimately looks like proper code but hardly allows for the application of real software engineering practices to it. And when you are ready to quit, the only way out is to export your application as a miscellaneous XML, which you cannot run anywhere else. This sucks, and we believe we could do better by assisting developers with more advanced tools. Application templates There are already a few application templates ready to install and extend, see more at https://github.com/openkoda/open... Our plans We are working hard on two objectives now: a) Building a partner network and onboarding software vendors to use Openkoda in their software projects. b) Building our managed cloud service where we can host Openkoda applications for business clients who would prefer someone else to take care of their applications. We need your help We are extremely interested in your critical feedback - just go to https://github.com/openkoda/open... to learn more about Openkoda and try it yourself.