Below are the main areas that our development team is working on, and we try to list the major items in each category to get a sense of where we are going and why.
Generative AI & Learning Ragic
Generative AI recently jumped to the top of our product roadmap list because of the huge potential for GPT technology to make learning and developing applications with Ragic so much easier. Ragic is quite a bit more powerful compared to other no code database application builders, but all the extra capabilities make Ragic a bit more complex and takes longer for new database designers to learn how to build sophisticated applications. GPT AI technology can move us much closer to the goal.
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Ragic builder bot: New users can say things like “Create a CRM system for a construction company” and the bot will create a fully functional Ragic application. This can serve two purposes, one is to quickly build the scaffolds for an application, the other is for the user to actually see the process of developing a full Ragic application, using an example based on his actual requirements. This would solve a lot of problems for users who just don’t know how to get started with Ragic.
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Ragic Q&A bot: A ChatGPT style bot that can answer questions that the users may have on Ragic based on Ragic documentations, courses, and knowledge base articles. This bot can be extended for further development into a bot that Ragic users can configure to answer questions based data in the user’s database.
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Generative design mode functions: Design mode features like generating selection field options, generating formulas, generating regular expression validations for users by describing their requirements in natural language.
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Updates to the Ragic documentation and learning courses: Generative AI tech will change how users learn Ragic, and we will be working on a revamp on our documentations and learning center to help users take advantage of the new generative AI.
Integrations
Integrations have always been a big part of Ragic product development, but we do feel that there is so much more we can do.
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Integration Platform support: Ragic currently support Zapier. New integrations for IFTTT and
Make.com(formerly Integromat) are currently under testing and review, which should be available soon. We will be looking at support for other integrations that would sync data to enterprise level applications like SAP and NetSuite. Workato, Celigo and Boomi integrations would be on the list for this category. -
Notification & reminder integrations: Right now Ragic sends out reminders or notifications on events by e-mail, mobile app push notification, and desktop notifications. We plan to expand these notifications to messaging services including SMS text messages, Slack, Whatsapp, LINE, and other services based on how popular the demand for that messaging service is.
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Cross Ragic account & server integrations: As Ragic grows more and more popular, we are starting to see the value of cross Ragic account features like “cross account convert record”, which is basically “convert record” that works across different Ragic accounts. Or the ability for Ragic partners to upload their Ragic application design to the Ragic template library for other users to install for free or for an annual template subscription fee.
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Marketplace integrations: Ragic is currently available on Google Workplace marketplace, AWS marketplace, QNAP & Synology application center. We are planning on deepening these integrations and adding more integrations like with Microsoft Teams, Stripe and other platforms for simplified access to Ragic.
Reporting
Reporting has been an area that’s tough for application builders because a lot of times we will be compared head-to-head with BI and reporting softwares that are fully focused on reporting. Our strategy has been making Ragic a good data source for customers to use their favorite BI and reporting tool to avoid building a full BI software. However recently we do see functions like widgets on Ragic sheets offers so much more convenience for users over using a separate 3rd party reporting tool. And we will continue working toward reporting features that would be much better off running on Ragic compared to using separate reporting tools.
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Widgets: Widgets were introduced this year to make Ragic sheets not only for transactional data entry and query, but can also give users an idea on the big picture on their data. We will be adding more functionalities to our current widget and considering adding different types of widgets. We welcome input on additional widget reporting features.
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Dashboards: We introduced the first version of our customizable account home dashboard this year. We will be creating a new dashboard report that works similar to adding different blocks to their account home, but on a customizable report page. This type of dashboard UI demand is quite high, and we will be adding additional types of blocks for users to add. We welcome input on new types of blocks that can be added to account home dashboards or on our future dashboard report.
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Mail Merge: The current mail merge function is based on a pretty old version of an open sourced library. We will be working on a re-write of the Mail Merge function with newer tools so that we can more easily add better support for features like extendable tables in Word document, generating PDF from Mail Merge, and to reduce resource consumption by Mail Merge.
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New types of reports: We regularly collect user input and decide on new types of reports to add, and we welcome input on this. Right now the reports in our pipeline includes: Correlation analysis report and radar chart.
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Report center: The new report center is for storing past generated reports and a place to allow for asynchronous report generation and automated periodical report generation. For reports that takes longer to generate, it would be a good idea to have a report center to show the progress of report generation without having a tab opened by the user waiting for the result. Also having the capability to see past reports without always generating a new one is a big plus for this approach.
General UI improvements
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Large subtables: Right now if a subtable within a record contains more than a few hundred rows, the whole sheet will start to run slower We would like to use lazy rendering techniques and subtable paging to help display large subtables.
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Responsive web app: Currently if you open a Ragic sheet with a mobile browser, you will see the spreadsheet interface as a desktop browser. We will be introducing a responsive version for mobile browsers that will behave similar to our native iOS or Android app using Flutter on the web. It should provide a much better user experience for new users when they open a Ragic link without Ragic app installed on their mobile device.
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Offline modes: Offline modes requires a significant re-write on the Ragic architecture, but may provide a good boost on the UI speed. This can also help users access their application when their internet connection is limited. Offline mode should work for both on desktop browser and mobile apps.
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Record insertion and manual sorting: Right now Ragic records on the listing page and subtables can be sorted by choosing a combination of fields. When sorting is not present, the sheet or subtable will be sorted by creation order. We would like to support a way for records to change order by drag and drop, and a way for inserting a record at a specific place when the default creation order is active. This should be supported on both subtables and listing page.
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More language support: Ragic currently supports English, Chinese (Traditional and Simplified), Spanish and Japanese. French version is currently under development. We plan on adding more languages including German, Arabic and Korean as the next step.
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