Grexx Platform update Dec 2023
Periodically, our Chief Technology Officer Bart Laarhoven updates us on the goings on in within his team.
Our CTO Bart takes you into the world behind Grexx, sharing insights on what projects his team is working on, what they’ve recently accomplished and what plans are still in progress. Peek behind the scenes of our platform with Bart.
It’s December 2023. I have been in the position of CTO for almost a year now, after taking over from my colleague Ton Romeyn at the beginning of the year. In recent years Ton focused more on innovation, while I have focused on technical developments. Starting this year, we formalized that in the job titles.
I have been working for Grexx for approximately 12 years in other roles, including as a product owner, consultant, and manager of the development team. Of course, the environment was not new to me. Still, this past year has brought a lot of new things. We've worked on some really cool projects with some new clients (you'll read more about that in new client cases soon!) and made quite a few more steps within the platform.
In the future, I would like to involve you, the user, a little more into that: what's going on behind the scenes, what we're working on and what's still on the horizon. For this first installment, I would like to focus on and highlight some recent updates:
• New Form Editor
• Additional endpoint in RESTful API
• Increased focus on usability
• New feature Excel-to-JSON system service
New Form Editor
For the past few months, we have been working behind the scenes on a new Form Editor. This is the WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) editor that allows users to build forms. Rebuilding was necessary because adding new features and improving usability was unnecessarily complex. On top of that, the user experience needed an upgrade, so we’d kill two birds with one stone.
Our new editor makes realizing new features easier (and thus faster). Users will notice that the editor works more smoothly, drags more easily and requires fewer corrections. The editor responds finer and faster to your actions. The new Form Editor will be rolled out to all Grexx Studios in early 2024.
Additional endpoint in RESTful API
Anyone who works with integrations between Grexx and external systems knows that it is can be cumbersome to call two different endpoints to perform one action. Previously, users had to first call an endpoint to create an activity, and then call an endpoint to send the activity. However, we have now added an endpoint to our RESTful API that allows you to directly send an (optional) activity: creating and sending have been merged. This saves an operation and simplifies the process for anyone who wants to "talk" to the Grexx environment from external systems.
Increased focus on usability
It may seem like a small thing, but that doesn't make it any less important: we've made a change so that the submit button now defaults to the bottom right corner. This is one thing we are adjusting so that the Grexx Platform better meets usability standards.
Previously, Submit and Cancel were right next to each other at the bottom right of the screen. Submit on the left, Cancel on the right.
Now by default, the Submit button is on the far right and cancel, we’ve moved to the bottom left.
This change conforms to international usability standards and makes Grexx Platform more intuitive to use. In the grand scheme of things, of course, these seem like minor changes, yet we feel it is important to pay more attention to them in the near future. My front-end colleagues are taking the lead in this, meticulously going through the platform with a fine-toothed comb.
New feature for Dataset-to-Excel & Excel-to-JSON
Are you using the Dataset-to-Excel system service? If so, you can now choose which worksheet and cell the data will be placed in. Previously, by default, this was the first worksheet, cell A1. From now on, you can select any target cell.
This is useful when you want to combine Excel template (partly) with data from an application, for example, an invoice template where you fill in certain fields (such as hours, prices, or product numbers) from your application.
Of course, we also included the other side: the Excel-to-JSON System Service has had a similar update. Here, too, you can now select any source cell, where previously it was only A1 on the first worksheet.
To take advantage of these new features, download the new version of the required system service from the marketplace.
This is a sampling of four of the features we've delivered in recent weeks. Curious about what else we are working on behind the scenes? Our team operates in three-week sprints, rolling out a new update every third Wednesday evening. More details can be found in the release notes.
Good to know: if you have any questions about the features of Grexx Platform, join our weekly Q&A session with my colleague Yannis. Do you have requests for new features or other concerns? We are always happy to hear them! You can also reach out directly to Yannis.
Curious about all the options?