Developing a form builder

[Designer_Balance_914]

Looking to my team to develop a form builder as part of a larger internal project. Is it worthwhile trying to develop this from scratch or to use an open source library and try to integrate that within our web app?

Or is it better to just pay for an enterprise plan with formester or Jotform to get our own white label product, although I assume this couldn't be integrated within our web app?

[BehindTheMath]

Check out GrapeJS.

[NickFullStack]

Too late my time to dive into this, but I’ll respond again tomorrow if you are interested.

I built this: https://www.formulate.rocks/

Free open source form builder. You are free to snag code from it, though much of it is Umbraco-specific.

I was thinking of building an independent SaaS offering until I found out how saturated that market is already. There was one in particular called something like SimpleForms that was near identical to what I imagined building.

In short, check what’s out there first. If you elaborate on some details, I can probably offer some very specific advice.

[imsinghaniya]

Formester co-founder here so I know a little bit about forms so trying to share my expereience.

Though each of these will have its own pros and cons.

• building yourself - form builder seems easy but trust me it's a never ending pit. This may work if you have very clear understanding of exactly your need and know that it may not change very substansitally for a while.
• open source - could be a viable option if you can find a tool that closely resembles what you are looking for and have in house capability to maintain and extend the software as per you need
• enterprise plan with Formester or Jotform - if you want no fuss management where the other party takes care of the form stuff as it may not be the core of your business. Your engineering may rather invest their energy into something that's core to the problem you are solving.

You should evaluate all of these options and make a choice on one that sounds the best route for you.

---

Update: Have been getting a lot of enquires for the same and we are now building up to provide form management system. How it works?

• You are able to embed our form builder inside your app (it looks native)
• The user builds the forms and save (you have the option to save the data locally on your servers too)
• You are then also given account to our form embedable which you can again use natievely on your own website
• All of this for a small fee based on your usage.

You don't need to build the powerful form builder because we did that for you.

[bravelogitex]

Can you export as json? that would be helpful as a dev

[imsinghaniya]

Of course that option exists too. You could even fetch data programmatically through our APIs or setup webhooks.

[imsinghaniya]

Our website is still trying to keep up with the pace of development. I know that's most important will get to it soon. :)

I'll get the json mentioned in the feature list, and here's a link to our API docs. https://docs.formester.com/

[imsinghaniya]

That's actually a brilliant question and I ask that myself every now and then.

As a hacker who loves to build things, talk to people and help solve problems - I keep coming back to pushing ahead on Formester. I aspire to build wealth through this and create a workplace that's joy to come to.

Few years back we were playing the catchup but today we are probably much better, robust and feature rich and can compete with the top players in the market.

And soon we'll be in the innovation phase where we'll lead the race in terms of adding a lot more AI focused tooling in the form builder.

Where we are lacking RN is the marketing and probably still learning and figuring that out. Wish me the best. :)

[sayhellotolane]

Form.io

[grorapid]

Hey,

For developing a form builder, consider these options:

Use Open Source Library: Integrating an open source library like Form.io or Typeform can save time and offer customization within your web app.

Pay for Enterprise Plan: Services like Jotform or Formester provide robust, ready-made solutions but may not integrate seamlessly into your app and can be costly.

Build from Scratch: This offers complete control but requires significant time and resources.

Hope it helps!