Hi,
I have a number of apps I want to create but can’t seem to understand why there is so much hype around Adalo/Airtable integration because I can’t seem to understand the real advantage of using Airtable over Adalo’s DB.
On Airtable yes, it is possible to easily see and change the data but, apart from that, I can’t really grasp a real significant advantage…?
If you guys could help me out it would be great.
Thanks!!
Valente
I haven’t used Adalo much but from what I can see there is no access to the Adalo DB from outside of an Adalo app. An example would be a remote device that don’t run an Adalo app that displays data that users placed into the Adalo DB.
I’m needing to build a project like this myself so I guess I’ll need to use Airtable or something similar.
I guess the biggest advantage of using Adalo’s database is that it’s a turnkey solution, so you don’t have to look for databases that play well with Adalo’s (current) platform.
Airtable is a lot more mature in terms of offering a database solution, albeit they don’t have user authentication.
Airtable’s interface is also a lot easier to edit data as compared to Adalo’s. Have you tried editing a data record in a collection with almost 200 records? It’s very sluggish, at least for now.
That said, I’m using Adalo’s database because of some limitations such as external databases’ relationships will only return the first string in an array (ie. if there are several related items in a field, eg. multiple products in a product category, Adalo will only return the first product).
That’s a dealbreaker for me, at least.
I wonder if the database is actually slow or if its the builder interface to the database. If you are trying to edit a collection from a completed app and its sluggish then that would be a little concerning. I have not experienced any of this sluggishness in my apps. Also, i was reading through the docs and found out that they are planning an api to connect to the collections externally. Adalo API This will solve my remote non-adalo IOT device problem that is was talking about in my previous comment. It seems that the Adalo DB is or will be able to do most everything. The only question that I would have yet is about redundancy. Are these servers built with redundancy so when one goes offline my app will still be functional? I guess if they are using AWS this should be built in.
I have many apps that share the same database. In the most complex one it is very sluggish sometimes impossible to update records. However, in the smaller apps that still have the same databases it is very agile. I recommend you creating another app that shares the same database then it is much easier to update values in the database from that editor.
So it appears to be the editor that is slowing things down. If this is the case its not to hard to work around this in production. Create a web app with the same database as your main app and build functionality into it to edit the collections from there. (Build an admin interface for the database) This is probably the “proper” way to do it anyway.
Yup. @ppvaldes is right about the editor causing the sluggishness.
Adalo isn’t a platform for you to build a single app with a hundred screens (I tried that and I’m working to keep it leaner now).
It’s still possible to work, but it gets hard to manage at some point.
Admins can use one app, users can use one app, and if you have mods or editors, they can use another app too.
Maybe for admins and mods, they can just the web app even.
It is indeed the editor/builder that is at fault in this regard to performance.
It is something we are working towards improving.
Are these servers built with redundancy so when one goes offline my app will still be functional? I guess if they are using AWS this should be built in.
We do use AWS so this is built in.
Also, i was reading through the docs and found out that they are planning an api to connect to the collections externally
This will solve a lot of use cases for limitations with the Adalo DB. This feature should be available in the next 2 to 4 weeks depending on internal testing and QA.
This topic was automatically closed 10 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.