VeilSpot Blog

No matter the size of your construction project, there’s always a ton to keep track of. From manpower to supplies to machinery, you have to manage a lot of moving parts, and the schedule inevitably changes. The good news is there are easy-to-use, affordable tools that can simplify and streamline your construction project management.

Whether you’ve got a five-man team or are managing dozens of subcontractors, you don’t have to spend a ton of money, time or effort getting everything you need in one place. Most of the out-of-the-box construction project management software is expensive, highly complicated and more than a lot of companies actually need.

Every company is different, so effective construction project management tools need to be flexible and easy to customize. That's the beauty of working with Quickbase as the foundation of your construction project management software. It allows you to bring information together from a huge variety of platforms and databases, customize your displays and get all your project management needs consolidated into the same place.

Ditch the spreadsheets. Sync up everyone’s schedules. And do it at a fraction of the cost.

Quickbase released a host of performance enhancements in recent months, intensifying the speed and efficiency of applications built within the platform. You may have already experienced increased efficiency from some of these features – such as faster batch deletes, the new default record picker behavior, an improved find formula function and a more efficient summary operator, just to name a few.

Long time Quickbase users and recent adopters alike should take note of the recent changes to the Quickbase platform. From the exciting updates to Quickbase’s dashboard features to the retirement of actions and automations – these changes will inevitably impact your application. 

Thankfully, the Quickbase updates offer some truly great opportunities that outweigh any potential challenges from the functionality that is being retired. Regardless of how long you’ve been using your Quickbase application, reviewing it with these changes in mind will help you to both improve your existing functionality and future proof your application.

If you’ve set up any of your essential workflows in Quickbase, it’s likely that you’ve used automations or actions to streamline your processes. These features allow you to reduce repetitive tasks and the number of clicks needed to transfer data from one system to another. Moving forward, however, Quickbase is consolidating action and automation features into their pipeline function.

The good news is that pipelines are a similar means to fully integrate your data and automate key elements of your business processes. With Quickbase pipelines, you can connect your SaaS tools (such as GMail, Slack, or OneDrive), and streamline how data moves between interfaces. For example, using a pipeline to connect Quickbase with your Salesforce account will make adding or updating contacts synchronous across both databases.

Making accurate, data-driven decisions is important in today’s rapidly changing business environment. In order to do that, however, you need a great reporting tool and a well-designed dashboard view. Quickbase recently released a powerful update to their dashboard functionality that goes far beyond just offering a prettier design and easier development experience.

It’s not hyperbolic to say that the new Quickbase dashboard features will revolutionize the way you see data, work with data and report on data in your Quickbase app. These updates offer tremendous potential for leveraging data across all of your applications, cutting and filtering information in ways that previously just weren’t possible.

Adding custom code to Quickbase Apps is a useful way to extend functionality and create quick solutions for your company’s needs. JavaScript makes up the vast majority of custom code that developers have added to Quickbase apps, which means it’s likely that you have some in your app. Until recently, this was an excellent and encouraged approach to customizing your applications. However, there are some upcoming changes to the way that Quickbase will be handling JavaScript. These changes may limit functionality in ways that could negatively affect your application. Importantly, if you don’t take action to address these changes soon, the consequences could be significant.

Changes coming in June and August will mean that the JSI in your app will no longer be editable, and your app might break.

When deciding which low-code app development platform to use, people often find themselves making a decision between two powerful tools: Quickbase vs. Power Apps. Both are strong contenders for solving critical business problems, automating processes and improving productivity and collaboration. However, each has its own strengths.

Microsoft Power Apps is touted as “a suite of apps, services, connectors and data platform that provides a rapid application development environment.” The goal of the tool is to provide a space for app development that doesn’t require a tremendous amount of technical expertise. The platform has several key strengths, particularly for enterprise organizations already using (and paying for) the Microsoft suite of tools. 

In a comparison of Quickbase vs. Power Apps, however, Quickbase comes out on top as a more flexible, versatile and easy to use platform.

In our work as Quickbase Consultants, we see so many companies who could be doing more with their existing Quickbase apps. Because Quickbase integrates with virtually every major app or platform, it’s an absolute powerhouse if you know how to put it to work. It’s just that many of the most useful Quickbase API integrations aren’t immediately obvious to those who haven’t been working with the platform as long as we have.

The other challenge is that too many organizations try to make the wrong app into their operating platform. Accounting software is designed for accountants. Collaboration tools aren’t designed to manage your inventory. Quickbase, however, is designed to be what you need it to be.

If you’re already using Quickbase to manage your data, you know what an incredibly robust tool it is for a wide range of uses. That being said, the standard Quickbase timeline report doesn’t offer the kind of flexibility that most project managers need. 

Too often, project managers end up pulling data out of their Quickbase system and into another program only to find there’s no way to then port that data back into Quickbase. The result is a frustrating and cumbersome process that fails to leverage the potential of your existing database.

Among the most ubiquitous project management tools out there, Smartsheet is a handy resource for simple data entry and tracking. However, as a project management tool, there are a number of key areas where it simply falls short. When making the comparison between Quickbase vs Smartsheet, the versatility, security and range that Quickbase offers make it the better choice for any kind of large-scale project.