Low-Code Development Platforms:

A Descriptive Study

Pedro M. Gomes
Miguel A. Brito
Centro ALGORITMI
Centro ALGORITMI
University Of Minho
University Of Minho
Braga, Portugal
Braga, Portugal
[email protected]
[email protected]

Abstract — Driven by the existing gap between developers’ vision where the most prominent and to-be use cases are noted, as
and the domains requirement, there is a growing trend on the well as the current theories and future work to be
application of Low-Code Development platforms. To understand implemented; finally, a brief discussion and conclusion to end
the state-of-the-art, key concepts, factors and variables that the study here made. For this descriptive study there was a
encompass the thematic of Low-Code Development platforms are
studied and presented in this study.
need to study the state-of-the-art of low-code solutions, and on
that account, there was established a search of the most recent
Keywords - Low-code Development Platform; Descriptive papers published in this sense. The main platforms form where
Study; State-of-the-Art. the work was obtained through Scopus, using the advanced
search tool. Firstly, the aim with this paper was to focus on a
I. INTRODUCTION descriptive review of test validation and project management
The surgency of terms like “low-code” or “no-code” are on LCDPs, but the lack of papers published on the subject
usually used when referring to platforms, applications, or (only eight papers retrieved) offered the opportunity for a
products with a high-level programming abstraction, that are broader review. From that point, the search was changed to
intended for end-user development (sometimes also called “Low-code Development Platforms” and the Open access
Citizen development) through Model-Driven Engineering were retrieved (the result was twenty papers), analyzed and its
(MDE) principles and that aim to serve as a tool for resolving information gathered.
prevailing challenges or for meeting new requirements. MDE Therefore, before the start of this study, it should be
is a software development methodology that centers models in understood then that when the term LCDP is specified it is
the development stage. To build a system based around MDE meant as a domain-specific language that resorts to MDE
principles, a domain expert first needs to model the principles and which aims to further raise the abstraction level
application on the platform, and after this the software should to a level where an end-user – someone with low to no
be able to either transform these into intermediary models or knowledge of programming skills – can solve new or
into source code. This methodology is often employed as the prevailing challenges or requirements with a technological
use of abstraction and automation can be a simpler, accurate solution.
interoperable solution for complex challenges or requirements
that often doesn’t involve a development team or II. CONTEXT ANALYSIS
programmers. In the scientific community, the terminology Low-code software is an emerging paradigm that is already
“end-user development” and “citizen developer” are used to present in the businesses, and the projections suggest this
define the users of platforms involving low-code features, tendency only becoming even more prevalent. A 2018 study
since the platform can be sold as a service for handling of that concluded that 23% of surveyed Application
elements with a high knowledge of the domain and little of Development and Delivery businesses (AD&D) were already
programming skills (Khorram et al., 2020). using LCDPs, and 22% planned to do so within a year
Low-Code Development Platforms (LCDP) caters from the (Outsystems, 2019).
growing need to swiftly develop vastly different technological This same study also highlights the main suppliers in the
applications with complex business logic. It addresses the LCDP market and ranks them contemplating twenty-eight
underlying disparity between the projects domain criteria, which are grouped into three main categories: Current
requirements and developers’ understanding (Al Alamin et al., offering, that accesses the width and depth of the tools and
2021). In this paper, it is reported a descriptive study on the platforms offered; Strategy, that allow the judgment of the
key concepts, factors and variables that encompass the supplier’s strategy, partners, commercial model, and material
thematic of LCDP and the current research and theories that programs to train and empower the customers; and Market
are being established by the scientific community. It is presence, that reflect the raw number of clients as product
divided into three sections, the Context Analysis, where the revenue and growth rates. This evaluation is presented in
context of LCDP is clarified, rationalizing this one with Figure 1 and is an adaptation of the Forrest report (Rymer et
empirical studies or systematic reviews already accepted by al., 2019). With an insight that there exists a trend with
the scientific community; LCDP Applications and Theories, business changing strategies by adopting LCDP to solve new

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requirements or challenges, it is crucial to also research the freedom and amount of choice provided by the ownership of
reasons why this change is being made. One of the papers the source code.
found during the research made to uncover the topic of LCDP
TABLE II.
was a search made on popular online developer communities –
Stack Overflow and Reddit – that aimed to provide insights on TABLE III. LIMITATIONS AND CHALLENGES OF LCDP WITH
the characteristics and challenges of LCDPs from a COUNTS(ADAPTED) (KHORRAM ET AL., 2020)
practitioners’ perspective (Luo et al., 2021).
Benefit Count

High learning curve 21

High pricing 13

Lack of customization 11

Slow loading and publishing 9

Less powerful than programming 6

High complexity 6

The hypothesis that can be made from this information and

that the authors also communicated was that LCDPs allows
users to build applications faster and with less effort. It
contributes to an agile development, but it also can lead to
higher loading and processing times. Besides these points,
there is also a fear of a “vendor lock-in”, whereas to the
freedom and amount of choice provided by the ownership of
the source code.
A large amount of developers agrees that LCDP provide a
Figure 1. LCDP Suppliers (Rymer et al., 2019) (adapted) “easy to study and use” alternative to programming languages,
but there is also the fact that some platforms have a certain
The data extracted (301 selected of 1574 retrieved posts learning cost. In some developers’ perspective, it presents a
between Stack Overflow and Reddit) from these forums was high quality, secure, scalable, and maintainable solution with
analyzed according to a set of research questions determined out-of-the-box implementation units, but with the downsides
beforehand, and then organized into lists that described the that it can also be a problem when it comes to modifying,
results found and the number of times that it was found during maintaining, and debugging the application.
the survey. Two of the research questions made the by authors The main consensus on the pros and cons of an LCDP, from a
where “What are the benefits of LCD?” (Table I) and “What practitioners’ perspective tend to be that these platforms can
are the limitations and challenges of LCD?” (Table II). be an easy, fast, and cheaper alternative to a more traditional
development approach that can be learned with more ease, but
TABLE I. BENEFITS OF LCDP WITH COUNTS (ADAPTED) (KHORRAM ET that comes with a high learning curve, a higher pricing and
AL., 2020)
with lesser customization to the solution and lower processing
Benefit Count speeds. However, one of the flaws of this paper is that there
can be a generalized bias from the practitioners and that the
Faster development 65 credibility of the users on the communities can be put into
Ease of study and use 52 question, since the forums are free to be accessed and
commented on.
Lower IT costs 18 Another source that can further help understand the reasons
Rich and ready-to-use units 14 why or why not to use LCDPs is the “The State of Application
Development” report (Outsystems, 2019), that illustrates the
Newbie friendly 10
surveys made to over 3300 IT professionals from different
Improved system quality 7 companies, countries, and continents and that highlighted the
Strong integration and expansion advantages and disadvantages low-code solutions can bring.
capability 7
The graph presented on Figure 2 represents the answers given
by the people surveyed on a percentile scale on the main
The hypothesis that can be made from this information and advantages of LCDPs. Reasons like digital transformation
that the authors also communicated was that LCDPS ALLOWS
users to build applications faster and with less effort. It acceleration, or better responsiveness to the business are
contributes to an agile development, but it also can lead to present and make up a better part of the votes
higher loading and processing times. Besides these points,
there is also a fear of a “vendor lock-in”, whereas to the

2022 17th Iberian Conference on Information Systems and Technologies (CISTI)

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 A. LCDP For Project-based Leaning
Accelerate digital The first case presented reports the adoption of LCDPs not for
innovation/transformation
its broad usability, but for the “newbie friendly” feature. In
Increase responsiveness to
the business
this paper, it is described how LCDPs were used to solved
66% 66% scalability issues of a project-based learning project for a
Reduce dependency on
hard-to-hire technical skill software engineering course.
Escape legacy debt The feedback from this approach was positive, and the authors
45%
report that with a LCDP solution, the result was a remarkable
Protect against technology balanced grades given the distinct background from the
28% churn students (Fernandes et al., 2020).
22% 20%
Enable citizen developers to
improve internal processes B. LCDP for Digital transformation of the manufacturing
Other industry
2%
This paper explains the way low-code development as
improved the digital transformations in manufacturing
Figure 2. Main reasons for using low-code development platforms. industry, by detailing the success case that is the use of a
(adapted)(Outsystems, 2019) LCDP named vf-OS that is able to manage the manufacturing
and logistics network (Sanchis et al., 2020).
Along the same line as the previous graph, Figure 3 presents
the answers provided show the main reasons why organization C. LCDP as Internet of Things tools
are not using or plan to use a LCDP. The focus is on concerns With the intention of creating languages and tools that
of lock-in, scalability, security and flexibility and the lack of support the development of Internet of Things (IoT) systems, a
knowledge and lack “success cases” of low-code platforms. study was made were the characteristics of existing LCDPs for
IoT. A taxonomy was unveiled, with the LCDP IoT solutions
Lack of knowledge about detailed and its limitations exposed. (Ihirwe et al., 2020)
low-code platforms
D. LCDP as an entrepreneurship tool
#REF!
Concern about lock‐ in
with a low‐code vendor
Designed for answering the question “how do low-code tools
50% Donʹt believe we could build affect growth trajectory and entrepreneurial success?” the role
the types of app we need of low-code in entrepreneurship is examined, with the LCDP
39% Concern about scalability of
32% Shopify serving as a use case. With the examination made, the
28% 25% the apps created
feedback is that low-code can be an alternative that requires
Concern about security of
10% the apps created “fewer resources to launch and grow but deliver similar value
Other for investors and employees” (Dushnitsky & Stroube, 2021).
E. LCDP for Citizen development
Figure 3. Main reasons for not using low-code development platforms. In hopes of demonstrating that LCDP can be used by regular
(adapted)(Outsystems, 2019) users with little to no programming skills to create
applications, a low code solution is proposed. The viability
III. APPLICATIONS AND THEORIES and the usefulness of such a solution are demonstrated (da
While the search made on the current papers developed with Cruz et al., 2021). As well as these use cases, there are also
the thematic low-code returned some empirical and descriptive reports that graze LCDP concepts for projects like Industry 4.0
studies, the majority of the finds were related either to use (Sahinaslan et al., 2021), to define role hierarchies and
cases that the scientific community is working on and that can permission for domain meta-models (Brunschwig et al., 2020),
serve as success stories or theories and new methodologies and to provide help with automating business processes
that are implemented on projects to be validated. With this in (Waszkowski, 2019).
mind, it is important to focus part of this descriptive study to
present the work that has been created in that sense. IV. CONCLUSION
Therefore, the section presented is divided into the papers In this section, we will first summarize the main findings of
found that reported or described LCDP applications in new the descriptive study performed for Low-Code Development
fields or approaches is detailed, with important conclusions or Platforms. With all the findings described, it is important now
annotation and the main theories and methodologies that work to summarize all the concepts, theories, and purposes of the
with or for low-code solutions.While either case could be theme in this paper.
detailed more carefully, the main position of this subsection is In terms of key concepts of LCDPs, it is important to
to present the current and new applications of LCDPs, hence understand the terms end-user development (sometimes also
the emphasis on keeping the detail level to a higher abstraction called end-user programming), citizen developer since it is a
level. prominent concept used in low-code themed papers, and
frequently not even clarified. End-user development is then

2022 17th Iberian Conference on Information Systems and Technologies (CISTI)

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the term used to refer tools that allow end-users (also termed ACKNOWLEDGMENT
citizen developers) to program and build applications. In other “This work has been supported by FCT – Fundação para a
terms, end-user development is the process through which Ciência e Tecnologia within the R&D Units Project Scope:
end-users or citizen developers can use a LCDP to build a UIDB/00319/2020”.
solution capable of solving new or existing challenges or
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2022 17th Iberian Conference on Information Systems and Technologies (CISTI)

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