I do not intend to be negative but you could use your app to make a better contact page rather than opening email client. This could be a good example on how you can use your app.
Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
31–40 of 62 posts
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#32I really like this! I was playing around and noticed "Number" field will return an "Internal Error" upon saving if numbers are out of _undefined_ range. (e.g. "0-99999999") and does not care whether the range is valid or not. - It is unclear what the meaning for "Regex" under 'Advanced' Number Form: Is this _just_ a label, or does it provide functionality of some kind? - Seems like "Save" in the upper right corner sh…
Ech, I will hotfix that number issue right now. Thank you!
The regex is probably more useful for the text fields, but it's a validation regex for the content of the field. We check it both client and server side, to make sure the user-entered content fits it.
The "Done" in the lower left is actually purely design at the moment, all it does is take you back to the add fields menu. Someone suggested that we add it in case users are confused about exiting the panel for an individual field.
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#33I do not intend to be negative but you could use your app to make a better contact page rather than opening email client. This could be a good example on how you can use your app.
Not negative at all! That's a good idea, I'll put that together. Thank you
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#34It looks nice at first glance. Eventually someone, somewhere, is going to get this right and it will be extremely popular. Maybe it's you, who knows. I bet there are hundreds of millions of dollars spent every year on full on huge projects that are essentially a simple CRUD application. Do you support writing event based code in some way?
We're working on integration with Zapier at the moment, it should be ready for the next major release. Do you have any suggestions for other event-based systems? Zapier is the only one I'm familiar with.
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Totally agree. I can't wait for someone to get this right! Many, many enterprise shops spend way too much time building simple CRUD apps. It's basically a "Microsoft Access/VBA" or "FileMaker" for the web.
Can't Access be used for web applications?
As far as I'm aware Access can only be used on one local machine, unless you put some networking system together yourself. There's no web-based version either that I know of.
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#36This is great. I've been trying to create something similar with everything stored key-val in postgres and a metadata table for relationships etc. It gets out of hand quickly.
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
Event based code, or even webservice callouts would be a killer feature. It was the first thing I started looking for on the page. With just a few more features this could easily capture a portion of the SMB market who's interested in something as flexible as Salesforce, but can't swallow the $85+ monthly cost per user.
Disclaimer: I work for a sister-company. "We" have something like this with event based "model actions" which also support calling out to webservices (both rest and soap). Shameless "competitor plug"; will remove if considered inappropriate: http://www.bettyblocks.com/en edit: App/marketing is being translated as we speak; you guys will be able to figure things out right? ;-)
> edit: App/marketing is being translated as we speak; you guys will be able to figure things out right? ;-)
I couldn't find a good demo on your site. Got a direct link?
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#38It looks like your access control is table level. Have you considered what it will take to provide row/column level controls? Also, the report builder looks like it doesn't allow you to set up complex reports (range queries). Can you add an abstract WHERE clause constructor? That would let you do things like collect all orders in the last week that were over 20 dollars, late on their delivery, or fulfilled by the new…
It won't be very fun to make, but the architecture should support column level controls for sure. Row level I'd have to look into in more depth. Right now we already have a system for hiding columns from specific tables where they aren't needed, and it's not just hiding them frontend, the column data isn't queried. We can probably hook into that.
That's a good point, the report builder doesn't support OR at the moment. The interface for that should be interesting.. We may just allow custom SQL queries and be done with it. We definitely plan to get into BI/analysis, I'll check those out.
We backup and log literally everything. The user actions aren't shown to Organization admins yet, but that's only because we haven't built a frontend for it. We're working on showing a list of actions taken by connected users. All changes to forms and submissions are also diff logged, and you can reset to any older version. The frontend for that has some minor bugginess that I'm working out, though.
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#39From a tech side this is great, but your pricing model is all screwed up. "Unlimited forms and fields" at the free tier? You need to align your pricing to scale with your costs. Limit by users but also the number of rows in the DB. MailChimp is a good example of aligning pricing with costs
"You need to align your pricing to scale with your costs" I strongly disagree with that. You should align your pricing with the value the user receives. To do this optimally, you need to have a good grasp of who your user is, how much value he receives from the software and how the typical purchasing process looks like. For an early stage company, all these questions may not be answered yet, so it is best to wait and…
You are correct and I posted that prematurely. Your pricing should always reflect the value you provide your customer. Helping a small company save 3% is worth less than helping Walmart save 3% and your company should price accordingly.
That said, if you have correctly priced your product, than the pricing should also align and scale with your costs, so you can use that as a quick short cut to evaluate a pricing model. When pricing doesn't scale with costs, it usually means your having properly valued your product.
I would argue that seems to be the case with the pricing for this Show HN
Re: Show HN: Forms – Easy custom database applications
#40Submitted, updated etc would probably benefit from time as well as date.
API endpoints for custom clients would be nice