Many backend engineers face an uphill battle when they are tasked with creating new business applications due to lack of knowledge of HTML or CSS. One of their biggest challenges is having an understanding of all the features and requirements that need to go into the application. However, making the application and all its features accessible for the end user can be equally challenging. Appsmith has recently announced the availability of pre-built application templates to make it easier for developers to build business applications, helping them understand the requirements to get started.

“Templates give you a really good starting point, help you address what are some of the core features you’ll require as well as help you make these tools really look good. And that’s a lifesaver for backend engineers,” says Nikhil Nandogopal, Co-Founder and Head of Product at Appsmith, on the latest episode of TFiR Let’s Talk.

Key highlights from this video interview are:

• Developers face two major challenges when creating new business applications: understanding the features and requirements of the application and making the application accessible for the end user. Nandangopal explains how their pre-built application templates are solving these problems.
• Appsmith’s pre-built templates cover a variety of common use-cases with tools for customer support, CRM and marketing.
• Developers struggle with finding the right building blocks for an application. Nandagopal discusses how Appsmith provides over 40 different widgets out of the box and other features that make it easy to build any UI without the understanding of HTML or CSS.
• Although Appsmith’s pre-built templates cover many mainstream use-cases, they are highly customizable. Nandogopal explains how they can be customized.
• Nandagopal discusses a new sync feature they are launching and how it will help developers adopt Appsmith so that it can fit inside the software development lifecycle all their applications go through.
• Internal tools often do not look as good as consumer facing tools, however, Nandagopal explains how Appsmith is helping developers build applications without UI or UX knowledge.
• Appsmith is actively working on a feature around role-based access controls, which is one of the most popular community-requested features.
• Nandagopal explains how their marketing portal, one of their top templates, is helping early stage marketing teams communicate with their users without the hassle of different softwares.
• Nandagopal discusses how the customer support dashboard is simplifying processes yet still have access to a high level of detail inside the dashboard. He explains why this is such a popular template.
• Engineers spend time hiring new candidates, however, the process can be chaotic and time-consuming. Nandagopal explains how their popular application tracker pre-built template is simplifying the processes and saving time.

Guest: Nikhil Nandogopal (LinkedIn, Twitter)
Company: Appsmith (Twitter)
Show: Let’s Talk
Keywords: Low Code/No Code

About Nikhil Nandagopal: Nikhil Nandagopal, co-founder of Appsmith, leads the development of the company’s product – the first open-source low-code platform for developers. He is a software engineer and entrepreneur with 10 years of experience building apps.

About Appsmith: Appsmith was founded in 2019 with the mission to enable backend engineers to build internal web apps quickly with a low code approach. Taking an open source software approach provides anyone with access to the software and the opportunity to get involved in the community. The company has offices in San Francisco and Bengaluru, India.

The summary of the show is written by Emily Nicholls.