What is our primary use case?
We have two primary use cases across multiple vendors and organizations, mainly in the medical sector.
First, we created a unified worklist for a large medical company in Saudi Arabia. This worklist serves over 17,000 employees daily, handling business processes like vacation requests, leave requests, business trips, and more.
We used Oracle Visual Builder Cloud Service as the presentation layer, the Oracle Process Cloud Service as the workflow engine, and Oracle Integration Cloud Service as the middleware. We developed over 200 business processes with this configuration. It's the first use case; it is called Employee self-services.
Our second main use case is extending Oracle SaaS (Oracle Fusion Applications) using Oracle Visual Builder Cloud Service. This allows us to improve and modify the user experience of the SaaS applications through integration. We primarily focus on creating pages that streamline tasks for employees.
How has it helped my organization?
One of our customers wanted to upload a huge amount of data using Excel sheets. They needed to upload thousands of records for analysis and do complex calculations on those Excel sheets. Oracle Visual Builder helped us achieve that.
Using the FileMaker component, we allowed them to upload Excel sheets and perform all the necessary calculations. We now have more than a hundred processes doing that – uploading Excel sheets and handling their calculations very effectively.
What is most valuable?
I like the low-code/no-code concept makes development much easier and faster.
Moreover, if you want to achieve more complex scenarios, you can write custom code using JavaScript, HTML, and CSS. It's very easy to learn, and there are many ready-made or built-in components that you can simply drag and drop to build your own screen in Oracle within hours. That's the most efficient thing.
Secondly, you don't need a dedicated IDE to develop. You can work from any browser, which is very convenient. And, with the cloud concept, your code is stored in the cloud, so you can modify it from anywhere, at any time.
Also, the critical point is scalability. If you have many concurrent users at the same time, you don't need to worry about it. Oracle will handle it. So, you can develop faster, ensure good quality, have good audits and logs, and you don't need an IDE at all. What could be better than that?
As someone with 10+ years of experience, I'm kind of old school, so I don't use drag-and-drop much. I work directly with the source code. But for new developers or fresh grads, it's very helpful. They can just drag and drop components without needing to write lots of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
For me, as an old-school guy, I prefer the source code. But the good thing about Visual Builder is that it serves both the old and the new way of doing things.
What needs improvement?
There are very minor things, like the feature called "action chains," that could use a bit of enhancement. But the team is perfect; they're working on it.
An action chain is a sequence of actions triggered by a button or an event. It executes code in order, from top to bottom. For example, it could call a code, call a REST service, and then insert data into a database.
It needs enhancement because it can be a bit complex for fresh grads or new developers to understand. It would be better if it was made more readable. That's the main point. But if you have experience, you'll understand it easily.
One more thing I want to add about Visual Builder: up until two years ago, it supported native mobile development. That's not available anymore. They replaced native mobile development with progressive web apps, and most customers are complaining about that.
We need native mobile development back – the ability to put apps on stores like Google Play or the App Store. That feature is not available right now, and they deprecated it starting in 2024. It's very important.
Otherwise, clients go with Flutter or other mobile development tools. It would be good for Oracle to regain that capability. We need the native mobile development feature back.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Oracle Visual Builder Cloud Service for the past four years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It is a very stable solution.
Over the past four years, working with multiple Oracle clients, we haven't faced any major issues. There was one time we had a problem with caching, and once we opened a ticket, they solved it within an hour. It's a very stable platform. If I'm going to rate it, it's a nine out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I have 15 developers, and it's mandatory for all of them to learn it. It's foundational. If you're working on the presentation layer, you should use Oracle Visual Builder or Oracle APEX.
All of our developers learn it. You can learn Oracle Visual Builder in a few weeks, maximum three weeks, and then you'll be ready to start development.
How are customer service and support?
I'm actually part of the Oracle Cloud community, so I have good contacts with the product manager and the director, Shay Shmeltzer. He's very helpful and answers most of the questions on the community.
Most of the times, you don't even need to open a ticket because you'll find your answer in the community. That's one of the best things about Oracle Visual Builder – they have a strong community.
We all go and answer questions there. Oracle Visual Builder development team actively answers questions on the community every day.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
We're an Oracle partner, so our focus is on using Oracle products. When we started using Oracle Visual Builder, it met our expectations. We're able to develop very fast with good quality, the platform is stable and auto-scalable, and we get great support from the Oracle team.
So, given all that, why wouldn't we choose it? It's a perfect fit for us.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup is very easy; anyone can do it. The installation is cloud-based. You simply provision an instance of Oracle Visual Builder – a few clicks of 'next, next, next', and you'll immediately have the platform ready.
It takes a maximum of five minutes in Oracle, and then you can start development.
Regarding deployment, that's also a couple of clicks. Once you have the application, you click 'preview' to check if everything is fine, then click 'stage,' and finally, 'publish.' It's very easy; anyone can do it.
Preview < Stage < Publish
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
It's not expensive when you consider what it provides: low-code/no-code development, faster development time, good quality, and good stability. And you pay per message, so you're charged based on your consumption.
It's a fair model. So, I recommend it to everyone. It is 100% worth my money at the end of the day.
What other advice do I have?
Overall, it's an excellent tool. If I'm going to rate it from zero to ten, I'd give it a nine and a half. They're constantly enhancing it every quarter, so they're doing a great job.
However, your requirements will determine if it's the right fit. If you need something very complex, you can definitely achieve it with Oracle Visual Builder. It can also handle very simple use cases. But it depends on how many users will be using it and your detailed business requirements. Ultimately, you have to consider the financial aspect – is it worth the cost?
*Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: customer/partner
