Visual Builder Studio Makes Mobile and Web App Development More Streamlined Than Ever

Oracle is continuing to mature its platform and tool suite for progressive web app (PWA) development. Over the past few years, it has become easier (and cheaper) than ever to build apps and manage application development projects using Oracle’s resources. Here are a few highlights you should know.

First: What’s the Difference between Visual Builder and Visual Builder Studio?

Visual Builder Cloud Service (VBCS) is the integrated development environment (IDE) for creating new PWAs. This is where you build the app, drag/drop widgets, and add logic using the rich set of tools, libraries, and other resources from Oracle. 

Visual Builder Studio is a project management platform. It includes the ability to manage the full build pipeline and integrate your team for maximum productivity and collaboration with continuous delivery automation. This makes it simpler to manage multiple projects and applications within each project from a single interface.

Visual Builder Studio Is a Win for App Development Teams

As more and more companies pursue mobile and web app development to create greater business efficiency, this project management offering will have tremendous value. Before Visual Builder Studio was rolled out, the various features were scattered in different places through the Oracle product suite. This meant paying a tidy sum to get access to things like Git. 

Now, Oracle has pulled together everything that’s needed to effectively run app development projects. And, they made it FREE for the Oracle development community. This is great news for mobile and web app development teams since these products are well-designed, well-supported, and robust. 

One note about this free platform: Although you can technically code within the Visual Builder Studio, a paid VBCS subscription is required to deploy and run apps for testing. The monthly cost is nominal compared to the functionality offered and the ways that progressive web apps can drive business efficiency.

Four of Our Favorite Features in Visual Builder Studio

Git: Obviously a Git repository is indispensable for version control and source management. Having this feature included free in the studio means Oracle customers don’t have the expense of getting GitLab from the OCI marketplace to be able to manage source code on their Visual Builder apps and extensions.

Issues: Debugging may seem like it’s never going to end. But it’s easier to stay on top of issues when your team has a dedicated place to submit bugs as they are found and track them through resolution. From the Issues section, team leaders can assign tasks to developers and each person can provide updates on their assigned issues.

Wiki: Even small teams need an effective (and well-documented) way to communicate ideas, content, and recommendations. This web-based collaboration tool hosted in Visual Builder Studio makes it simple to keep this information within the project management platform.

Boards: For Agile development, nothing beats a good Scrum board. Visual Builder Studio streamlines this aspect of functional pipeline development by having boards as a key component, ensuring that progress (or delays) are visible at all times. 

Haven’t Moved to Visual Builder Studio Yet? Getting Started Is Easy

Oracle is making adoption of this free platform as simple as possible. Basically, you export the app from your Visual Builder instance and import that code into a new project in Visual Builder Studio. The life cycle of the app is a bit different here since you will use the VB Studio build jobs to package and deploy apps. You can read the steps and watch a video about moving Visual Builder Apps into the studio here. 

Looking for more assistance with app development in Visual Builder Studio? Contact our team today.