The Lino framework

A free framework for writing database applications

What is Lino

• Lino is a high-level framework for writing customized database applications.
• More than MS-Access for cheaper than SAP
• Lino is written in Python and JavaScript, based on Django and Sencha ExtJS.
• Lino is free software.
• Lino is slowly growing from a one-man project into an international community.

For whom

• Primary target users of Lino applications are organizations and companies who need a customized database application.
• Lino as a framework is designed to be used by professional developers who write and maintain a database application for their employer or for their customers.
• A small but growing collection of existing Lino applications is to be used by hosting providers who offer professional hosting of one of these applications.

Rumma & Ko OÜ

• Exists because Luc moved to Estonia.
• Small and successful since 2001.
• We do development, maintenance and end-user support of free customized database applications.
• Since 2009 we are investing most of our energy into Lino.

Growing slowly

• During the first decade we satisfied our customers with only one full-time developer.
• But our customers had more projects than a single person can deliver.
• Only in 2015 we started to build our own team. At the same time we continue our search for partners.

15 years

Mastering a complex database

Typical Lino applications have a rather complex database structure.

Lino Welfare

• Lino Welfare is used as a central administrative tool for PCSWs (Public Centres for Social Welfare) in Belgium.
• A PCSW is a public agency in every city where inhabitants can apply for social help.
• About 60 users in 2 production sites
• Functions : clients, calendar, reception, workshops, job supplyment, contracts with employers, debts mediation, …

Lino Avanti

• Lino Avanti is used by social workers in East Belgium for helping immigrants with their “integration course”.
• The integration course is a Belgian administrative procedure consisting in an individual mentoring and a series of courses, with the goal of helping new residents to acquire the base knowledge about society and social relations in Belgium in order to ease their integration on the territory.
• developed by order of the Ministery of the German-speaking Community of Belgium (Ministerium der Deutschsprachigen Gemeinschaft).
• About 4 main users + external course providers

Lino Voga

• Lino Voga for managing courses, participants and meeting rooms.
• 3 main users (Monique, Gaby, Roger) + 5 occasional administrative assistants + 20 teachers (planned)

Lino Noi

• Lino Noi is the ticket management and time tracking system used by the Lino team.
• Eat your own dog food
• 3 active workers, a few users and other collaborators

Why free software

• Proprietary software developers try to avoid sharing their knowledge because they consider it their private property.
• Free software developers work differently because they have other priorities.
• Many frameworks are designed for usage by proprietary developers and their customers.

A personal choice

• I believe that software must be free because the more our everyday lives depend on computers, the more it is important to decide who controls these computers.
• Many companies and organizations ignore the important role of software for their long-term success.
• I refuse to invest my time into proprietary knowledge because I believe that the situation is alarming.

The dependence on Microsoft

• causes costs to rise continuously, and blocks technical progress in government organisations;
• systematically undermines European procurement and competition laws;
• gives Microsoft overwhelming political influence, culminating in personal interdependence as well as penetration of schools and universities; and
• puts government IT systems, together with their citizens’ personal information, at high risk both technologically and politically.
• (Source: Investigate Europe)

Who makes money with Lino

• Rumma & Ko (Estonia) is currently the main developer and hosting provider.
• DigitalServices (Tunisia) works as freelancer for Rumma & Ko
• AbAKUS it solutions (Belgium) provides professional hosting to Lino users
• WPJ s.r.o. (Czechia) develops and maintains inhouse Lino applications

Design goals

• Lino applications are intuitive and easy to understand for the end user.
• Lino applications are easy to maintain because the framework encourages sustainable application development.

Wish list

• Low-cost mass deployment for Voga or Noi. We are looking for somebody who wants to run that business.
• Lino applications are not yet mobile friendly. We are working on it.
• Lino is not yet well documented. It is a young framework with a small community. But our community is growing and we are working on it.

Limitations

Lino is not for you, if...

• you just want a cheap, quick and dirty website with dynamic content
• you don’t want to spend your time into developing or optimizing your application
• you want a cool website featuring the latest web technologies
• you don’t plan to maintain your application over a longer period

Not sexy

• Lino applications don’t try to be “sexy”.
• They are optimized for people who get a few hours of training before they start using it and who will use it for their everyday work.
• With Lino it takes a few hours before an end user starts loving it, but that love is deeper and last longer.

Good enough

• The Lino user interface is just good enough and not more.
• “good enough is not enough” is a true vocation for some people,
• but these people are not the majority
• we should stop making the masses believe that they need more than “good enough”.

About beauty

• Lino is a programming library, not a user interface.
• The beauty of Lino lies beyond the first impression.
• End-users love Lino because it does what they want it to do.
• Developers love Lino because it is powerful.

A powerful expert tool

• Lino as a framework does not even try to be easy to learn.
• The Lino framework is too complex for occasional usage.
• There are other frameworks who can deliver quick visible results.
• This is a design choice, not a limitation.
• You need an experienced Python developer for creating new Lino applications.

A big beast

• Lino is a big beast to tackle for a developer
• (comparend to plain Django or similar frameworks)
• Because it has rather high-level UI concepts:
• tables, forms, slave tables, menus, actions, virtual fields...

For the stakeholder

• For a stakeholder this means that you need an experienced Python developer for creating new Lino applications.
• Yes, such people tend to be expensive these days
• Python was second after Java in 2016, according to Highest Paying Programming Languages In 2016

Lino vs. plain Django

• The difference with plain Django projects is that Lino applications have an out-of-the box user interface.
• Advantages: everything gets much easier:
• writing a prototype, changing database structures and business logic;
• long-term maintenance and documentation.
• Disadvantage: you are limited to applications that fit into this out-of-the box user interface.

Think in Python

• When using Lino as a developer, you should understand a fundamental design choice of the Lino framework: Lino requires you to think in Python.
• We believe that database structure, screen layouts and business logic should be written in plain Python, and not in some additional text file format like XML, or using a visual GUI editor.
• Yes, this requires you to know Python before you can see a result.
• The advantage is better maintainability and re-usability.
• This choice is important when it comes to maintaining complex database applications in a sustainable way.

Sustainable software development

• agile programming and rapid prototyping
• short release cycles
• libraries of reusable code
• extensive unit testing
• use open standards

Search for partners

• IMIO (July 2012 - April 2013)
• CodeGears (mylino.org)
• Alexa (February 2016)
• July 2016 -- Search for independent hosters
• Jüri (September 2016)
• Abakus (September 2016)

Search for developers

• Joe (Sept 2013)
• Manuel (Feb 2014)
• Hamza (Sept 2015-)
• Rauno (October 2016)
• Tanel (January-April 2017)
• Tonis (Feb 2017-)

The future?

• We believe that Lino and our business model have a future that goes beyond the career of a few developers.
• Our strategy is to follow a gentle and sustainable way, making Lino grow into a community project.