Getting Started

Where Do I Start with the Mendix Platform?

Mendix’s rapidly growing community consists of a wide range of people, from citizen developers and business analysts who can build Mendix applications without any coding experience, to hardcore developers who build all kinds of apps and extend the Mendix Platform with custom code.

In order to onboard this variety of users, Mendix provides an onboarding tour based on the user profile and preferences. After that, Mendix users can use Mendix Studio Pro as their main IDE as well as external IDEs that integrate with Mendix. In Mendix Studio Pro, you can build complex integrations and extend your app with custom code and more advanced features. This low-code development IDE enables everyone from business users to experienced professional developers to build advanced apps.

The free online training materials that Mendix provides are built in a modular fashion. This means that you can skip modules depending on your knowledge, or only complete the knowledge checks to see if you need more information about a specific topic.

In addition to Mendix being free to try and evaluate, the Mendix Free Edition gives all users unlimited access to the platform and community environments. For more details, see Can I Evaluate Mendix Before I Buy? below.

How Can I Kick-Start My App Development Project?

The Mendix Platform provides several templates as part of the onboarding process for creating new applications. They are available for everyone and ready to be used right away.

Templates are complete app frameworks that can be used as a starting point when building a new app on the Mendix Platform. They already include the required scaffolding to build towards a solution for a specific business case. Templates have built-in forms, approval processes, purchase request flows, and surveys, which will massively accelerate your app development.

They include the Mendix UI framework, which brings you great, consistent user experience to the solutions you build with Mendix. If it fits the use case, a template also includes workflows, with which you are able to automate processes end to end with low code. The templates are continuously updated to the latest Mendix version to include the latest and greatest features that Mendix has to offer.

You can also upload your own template to your Private Marketplace to make them available as starting points for everyone in your organization. This way, they can be used to create the root model of all new apps. In addition to basic design patterns, they will often include complete functional building blocks, such as user onboarding workflows, integration frameworks, document management, business rules, and processes.

How Does Mendix Onboard New Users?

Visual development is fast and easy to understand for all type of users, which means that Mendix onboards users with different knowledge levels and goals on the platform. During the signup, users have the option to share their preferences and goals for using the platform. Based on that information, Mendix tailors the onboarding tour to their preferences while providing other help methods, links to our online Mendix Academy material, supplementary content, and suggestions for your next steps. This guidance helps users to understand and navigate the extensive and powerful Mendix Platform.

Can I Evaluate Mendix Before I Buy?

No problem! Anyone can sign up on the Mendix Platform. This will create a Mendix account for you, and you will have access to the Mendix Free Edition. Free Edition means that no credit card is required, and there are no setup fees.

What Does the Free Edition Offer?

The Mendix Free Edition includes everything you need to design, build, and deploy demos, prototypes, or small applications. All the features in the Mendix Studio Pro IDE are available without restriction. This edition includes a free deployment environment for each application to the Mendix Cloud.

The Free Edition is designed to provide developers and business users with a rapid cloud deployment option for prototyping and testing new applications, without having to provision a full cloud node.

When Should I Upgrade from the Free Edition to a Paid Edition?

The Free Edition is designed for prototyping and testing new applications, and is not meant as a professional testing or production environment. You can test the full capabilities of the platform in the cloud environment of the Free Edition. Due restrictions on scaling, and the fact that the app goes into sleep mode after a period with no activity, the Free Edition cannot be used for professional app development projects.

When you start a professional app development project, you will need more enterprise-level features and services (for example, more deployment options or formal service-level agreements). In that case, you will need to upgrade your app to a paid cloud environment. Upgrading is easy, as you will keep your user account and all the apps that you have already built.

What Is the Definition of an “Application” & How Big Can an App Be?

The short answer here is that you decide, because there are no limitations. You need to focus on your business needs without having to work around artificial limitations to make your app fit into a licensing model (while risking big upcharges). At Mendix, you do not have any of these limitations.

Technically, an “app” is the complete application as it is set up and organized in the Mendix Platform. It can contain any combination of screens, database entities, processes, and functional components. You will determine the size of an app based on your use case and desired user experience, as well as the app design, model complexity, and maintenance considerations.

It is important to note that the architecture of your app is very important. Speed and flexibility typically drop when an application becomes too big or complex. The Mendix Application Quality Monitor (AQM) provides insight on the right granularity of apps and microservices.

How Many Applications Can I Build and Deploy?

There is no limitation to the number or the complexity of applications you can build and deploy using the platform when you select the Mendix Free, Pro, or Enterprise Platform Editions.

What Are the Mendix Training Options?

The Mendix Academy is integrated into the platform and provides both classroom and online training options.

For all the details on learning Mendix and getting certified, see the section What Are the Mendix Training Options? in Skills & Training.

print