Converting Legacy Microsoft applications to Bubble.io web apps

Migrate your old Microsoft small business apps to Bubble = it could be a very good idea 💡!

Introduction

I recently had a conversation with Zee, a veteran IT business owner based in the USA. He reminded me of the significant pain and cost of maintaining older, custom-built Microsoft applications for some of his small-medium business (SMB) / small-medium enterprise (SME) clients.

Pain Points

These pain points include:

• Being asked to work on applications that were built in modules based on the limitations of tools 15–20 years ago, e.g. Microsoft Access/Visual Basic systems. This is the programmer’s equivalent of an archeological dig site ⛏.
• When older .NET frameworks or other tools are deprecated, entire apps need to be rebuilt.
• Data is often stored on-premises and without reliable backups.
• Significant interruptions to business continuity can occur when vendors roll out changes without sufficient warning. There is often a large cost to the SMB/SME to rectify changes, often with long downtime for the business.
• Over-reliance on one or two key IT team members, who have intimate knowledge of the software but have not documented it.
• Business logic resides in the front-end, resulting in significant processing delays when report generation is required. (Not adhering to the DRY code or “Don’t Repeat Yourself” mantra)
• The cost to maintain and upgrade the software to the latest Microsoft technology is in some cases higher than the original cost of building the software.
• The cost to run the software on Microsoft’s cloud is very high due to a shift toward SAAS-style pricing models compared to the one-off license fees of the past.
• The cost to rebuild the software in modern full-stack web technologies is significantly more than the cost to upgrade to the latest Microsoft version.

During the conversation, I had several flashbacks to my time working for our state government’s health department. Legacy systems. Vendors no longer support their products. Microsoft SQL Server Stored Procedures that hadn’t been touched for 15 years because nobody wanted to “break” them, despite taking users 30 minutes to generate reports. Three or four internal staff paid six-figure salaries to sit around and nurse these platforms to their graves, but nobody making any proactive changes.

Pain Points Summary of Legacy Microsoft Applications for SMB/SMEs

1. High risk to stay — no vendor support, on-prem storage, “my app only runs on Windows XP” situations
2. High cost to move to the obvious alternatives (modern Microsoft tech or another full-stack web tech)
3. Not leveraging cloud and APIs.
4. Low maintainability.

What you get with Bubble

When you create a new Bubble.io app, you get the following features out of the box:

• A fully customizable relational database that can handle complex data structures.
• Fully configurable User Types within your app. Need a Super Admin, Admin, Team Member, Manager, Analyst, Tech, and Client access? Bubble’s privacy rules allow you to secure your data at a Table, Row, and Column level for every User Type you define.
• Is easy to learn — programmers can pick it up in 3 months.
• Fully customizable User Interface, in line with modern front-end web development (Bubble released their Flexbox responsive engine in June 2022). Deploy screens for desktop and mobile web browsers, or wrap the app and submit it to the Apple and Google app stores.
• A fully-functioning, modern API, allowing you to connect to other APIs and other apps to connect to your app’s API. For example, send emails, SMSs, connect to external Calendars, Accounting Tools like Xero, and payments like Stripe with ease. All of this opens up the possibility of workflow automation and integration with your other cloud-based tools.
• A Plugin marketplace to extend the front end.
• System monitoring, logs, and a task scheduler.
• Support from Bubble’s team (who are effectively your Dev and Dev Ops team, managing the underlying infrastructure and future-proofing your “visual code”…Bubble’s preferred term for its tool).
• A very fair pricing structure. Many internal business apps could run for $29/USD per month, plus any external subscriptions they require.
• A growing and active community.

Considerations and possible risks of using Bubble

• Bubble.io is still relatively small, although they have grown a lot bigger in the last year since raising their Series A round in 2021. They are moving quickly to improve their support services and general platform robustness.
• The number of strong developers on Bubble.io is still small, but quickly growing.
• Building out high-quality, scalable apps is still hard and takes planning on Bubble. You face the same maintainability issues as Microsoft if you don’t hire a good technical architect with experience in Bubble to oversee your project. This being said, Bubble does prescribe the way a lot of things are done so this at least keeps some guard rails up.
• Bubble is still working on tools to support SME/SMB clients long-term, like greater transparency of code changes when multiple devs are working on the same project. I wrote more about features I’d like to see here.
• It can still be slow to build complex apps on Bubble because reducing the dev time (which Bubble does significantly) doesn’t remove the time for Product Managers, Business Analysts, UXUI Designers, QA Testers, Project Managers, and Trainers to deploy the new application into a functioning business with continuity concerns. These are problems we are wrestling with at MomentumGroup.tech and have some solutions in the pipeline.
• Vendor lock-in at an infrastructure level. Yes true, but this is also where a lot of the cost savings are created, through not having to manage this infrastructure.
• Data sovereignty could be an issue if your government requires your type of app’s data (e.g. healthcare, financial data) to be stored in your country.

Summary

In conclusion, Bubble is a great option for SMEs and offers an affordable entry point to building internal business applications in the cloud, with the option of client-facing functionality and leveraging web services via API.

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I expect to see a big shift towards tools like Bubble from SMEs as they look for innovative ways to perform their business more efficiently and maintain their own internal and client-facing applications.

Please contact MomentumGroup.tech if you are looking for a cost-effective solution to migrate legacy Microsoft Business apps into the cloud and you’d like to understand if Bubble.io is the right tool for your use case.

Looking to build and launch a career in Bubble? Join us at Momentum Academy