Appirio's just released a software package that lets enterprise customers put together an iPad or iPhone app almost on a click-and-drag basis. The apps are hooked together using Salesforce.com's cloud-based systems, and pushed out "live" to business's iPad users.
Sounds simple, but Appirio's new package comes with huge promises, too. It allows developers with almost no iOS experience to build an app, meaning they could even be company executives rather than coders. Its home base in the cloud means it won't hog up company hard drive space, either. As founder Narinder Singh tells Fast Company, it's really hard today for businesses to put together their own apps, since "you want the experience of a native app that feels like Angry Birds but you don't have the experience to build it yourself." Companies find themselves using in-house coder teams, but that's not necessarily speedy or cheap.
Hence the new package, which basically lets firms quickly strap together a native iPad or iPhone app to meet a particular business need, distribute it to their staff, and have them "updated in real time, in the field without needing to redeploy," Singh says. And unlike a web-app solution, mobile apps can allow companies to manage apps in a much more centralized, controlled way, and leverage the extra powers a native app on an iPad and iPhone can have compared to a more limited web app--including ease of use, since they use all the familiar input methods used by iOS. To speed up the app-building process, the company's even put together a suite of template apps, including systems like field surveys, location-based apps, time and action-tracking apps, and search and display apps.
Thanks to my partner Jack Ricchiuto (@zenext) for pointing me to this article. I recently told him that DIY SaaSs that let the user build their own apps, like you can do with Podio (http://www.podio.com) for project management, were the future of what I call "self-service computing" made possible by the Cloud.
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