MobileFrame Business Suite

Benefits:

We have been developing solutions with this software platform since 2008 for customers. It is not just a development environment for the application, it is a full lifecycle management platform as well. This includes the ability to interrogate the client's database, view the client's screens, and remotely update the clients. This platform can work for a small customer, mid-size or large Enterprise. Extremely scalable and can work with Android, iOS, and Windows. It can be deployed to the cloud or on-premise. Applications can be written in a small fraction of the time as traditional mobile development environments. Clients can operate thick or thin (web based).

Drawbacks:

Nothing. After introducing the software to work with Android and iOS

In sum:

Excellent at developing Inventory Management, Marketing, Work Orders, Proof of Delivery, Service, QA, Inspection, and Work In Process applications. MobileFrame has pre-built application templates you can purchase as well. I don't know of a single mobile application we haven't been able to provide with it.

Benefits:

Ease of Use, coming from a non-technical background and after completing the training I thought the toolset was relatively easy to pick up, it still took a lot of work on my end, but with the continuing support of MF I feel I am producing very functional apps.

Drawbacks:

I found it a little difficult to sync the data from the client handhelds back to the MF server, but once I had a solid understanding of the toolset and how MF works I found it much easier. This took a lot of explaining from the MF support team and they were very patient with me. Keep in mind, IT is not my background, but after making the commitment to really understanding the software I feel I have developed into a very functional user.

In sum:

Overall very good.

Benefits:

The GUI development environment with drag and drop of fields, buttons, labels, etc. is very nice. You can set up a layout for specific devices, like iPads, iPhones, Windows, etc. and you can define landscape and portrait layouts for each page of each device. Changes in one layout can be easily cut and paste into another layout, for multiple devices, making changes easy to apply in multiple places. The code-free workflow steps offer many powerful features, including creating PDF files, sending e-mails, working with grids, reading data and writing/updating data, etc. A person with no C# (object oriented) programming experience can create great, functional apps quickly, and changes can be made, tested and deployed quickly. Comments can be added easily and appear with many different background colors and text colors, and you can make the text bold, which helps the comment to stand out. Lines or sections of code can be disabled, which grays them out, which is a useful feature. The apps and data can be shared with or removed from users quickly and easily. The remote viewing capabilities are helpful.

Drawbacks:

When you are working with complex apps, you can end up with a lot of fields, functions, grids, data objects, etc. The MobileFrame Desktop development tool provides a lot of "Find" functionality; i.e. finding references to fields, types of workflow steps, references to data objects, etc. This is very helpful in searching for references when you are editing an app or debugging your development work. Some of the sequences of workflow steps can get very lengthy, and it would be nice to have a NEXT - PREVIOUS button pair for advancing through the steps for the next occurence of the "Find". This is more of an inconvenience than anything. Most sets of workflow steps are not that long and the Find identifies the lines in a way that is visually attention-grabbing.

In sum:

It has been a pleasure to work with this tool. The development has been quickly created and quickly implemented. Major changes can be quickly edited and implemented. [By "quickly" I mean compared to having to make a similar change using an OO language like C# to make the same changes. Obviously complex apps with a lot of functionality take time to develop properly.] In some cases, I can make a complicated change in logic in multiple workflow steps, adding new fields to multiple layouts and pages, test everything, and promote it to production in a few minutes. The MobileFrame Support team has been FANTASTIC! Everyone that has helped me has been prompt to reply to my e-mails, and been knowledgable in helping me. When necessary, I have received help and suggestions from the [SENSITIVE CONTENT HIDDEN] and top technical people from the company. They are not just about "getting my ticket closed", but they want to make sure that I resolve my problem while following the best practices possible for development. The support is very good, and I would rank it among the best that I have worked with in my 32 years in the IT industry as a developer.

Benefits:

I love having total control of the database as middleware, and have also developed applications by expanding the MobileFrame database. That flexibility is amazing. I also love being able to develop an app for windows, Apple, and Android all at the same time. Best scenario for an agile rollout.

Drawbacks:

Initially, the platform was quite costly. However, new susbcription models make this far more palatable.

In sum:

Very good overall with the platform itself.

Benefits:

If you know how to write formulas in Excel, MobileFrame is pretty easy to learn. If you know how to write extensive macros in Excel, it is SUPER easy to learn. I can get a new app programmed in just a few hours and add requests from the field at least that fast. We use a lot of applications in the field and none of them allow customization like this one.

Drawbacks:

It took a while to get everyone programmed to go to the MobileFrame application on their devices. It would be awesome if there was a way to customize the way it appears on iOS to actually show a custom icon.

In sum:

MobileFrame technical support is second to none! They will always help you fix your problem and probably teach you some more tricks while you are on the phone.

Benefits:

The absolute best thing about this software is the ability control what you want to do, how you want to do it, and when you want to do it. MobileFrame allows non-developers to design, create and maintain applications without having to write software code. If you know how to write basic Excel formulas, you are able to create applications in MobileFrame. All it takes is a creative mind and the ability to think through business processes to design the application that fits your needs.

Drawbacks:

The licensing structure is a little confusing. Not due to the amount of the cost but just the way it is presented. I'd like to see an easier way to add users and components without it being a major project. Application wise, there is nothing that I hate or even dislike. There is some functionality that I'd like to see tweaked or modified, nothing major though. Suggestions are included in new releases occasionally, so feedback is taken.

In sum:

We have been very pleased with the MobileFrame Business Suite. We use it for a wide variety of applications, across all business functions. It has become one of our most used and most reliable tools.

Benefits:

Application Roll Out is quick and agile User Friendly design requires very little training Flexibility to integrate to third party ERP and applications Ability to run on all three top operating systems (Windows, iOS and Android) Technical Support is top of the line

Drawbacks:

Perpetual license slightly on high side, however their subscription model is extremely affordable

In sum:

MobileFrame application implementation to rollout is seamless and the support we received along the way put MobileFrame above all other mobile data capture solutions.

Benefits:

Ease of implementing changes and auto synchronization

Drawbacks:

It is still a Challenge to print in IOS devices

In sum:

Coming from a custom c# code and all the nightmares of keeping the same version In all hand helds has made our mobile operations a much easier to handle job.

Benefits:

The forms designer is one of the best features of the platform. It allows robust workflow-based paginated forms that are not the generic scroll-down forms like you would find with the cheaper solutions.

Drawbacks:

It lacks many of the native web service integrations offered by some of the competitive cloud-based solutions. Abilities to perform integrations are robust, but must be customized.

Benefits:

I like the integration capabilities. Mobileframe can integrate to all kinds of databases with ease which saves our company a lot of time and energy when we are pulling in data from different sources.

Drawbacks:

The only con I can think of would be that some of the features of the applications don't work the same on the thin client as they do on the native device clients, but I believe this is related more to the capability of browsers to interact with other applications than mobileframe's architecture.

In sum:

We have leveraged this product extensively across the company to increase efficiency and decrease the number of silos we have within the organization. From asset tracking to field productivity reporting, mobileframe has the capability to fill your business needs and the only real limitation is your creativity and understanding of how to apply the tools.