I agree with the above. We need normal documentation for each cube, for each function. So that by going to a cube or opening a function, you can understand why it is needed and how to use it correctly. If it doesn’t fit into the cube, at least a link from this cube to a page with a description and examples.
And yes… when I paid for the product, I looked at the huge list of services with which it can work, but in fact it turned out that there was very, very limited functionality. It’s good that there are tasks for which I was able to use it.
Of course, you started doing some kind of training, but it’s more like an introduction to programming. And for some reason, instead of development, there is now a regular rewriting of the first tutorials.
It seems to me that you would be better off spending this time on a detailed description of at least the basic functionality. Especially the trigger one, from which all flows begin.
I appreciate the honest feedback but this topic is dedicated to understand the gaps to a polished product so let’s keep it a productive place for that!
In real life, we have thousands of users relying on Activepieces so this is not the exact concern we have, the concern is to understand how we could get to an awesome final product.
These are not reviews, but feedback from customers on the shortcomings of the product. It is unclear what exactly you want to hear in this topic? Can you rephrase the request?
Your feedback is great and we’re taking it seriously, but @HoldYourWaffle’s last comment was unproductive in this thread (while it could be good feedback in a separate post).
Regarding documentation, I agree and let me explain what we are doing at the Automation School:
We are writing and refining the first basic course to agree on the tone, style and nature of the future lessons.
We’d like then to identify the gaps in the content in collaboration with the community.
We’ll cover these gaps and more.
While this might take some time, we want this to be an integral part of the Activepieces community rather than just quick documentation done through development.
I’ll post a similar topic to this one soon to identify gaps in the content and the learning material to include it in our plan.
@Tobias_Geisler Our goal is to polish the product and the learning journey around it.
We don’t make promises that we’ll reply to all individual requests in the community. Thanks for pointing out to your issue so we can see how the product can seem more polished in the areas you mentioned.
Specifically, the generic error you got is what concerns us as you don’t have a clear way to resolve the issue by yourself.
Thanks @Verso for the feedback. If you mean you purchased it as a lifetime deal on AppSumo, we had 79 pieces when we launched there back 7 months ago, and we now have more than 190 pieces.
I didn’t see an automation tool growing faster than this in the market unless they auto generate their connectors from APIs which is still far from being usable by no-code users.
I don’t intend to defend but I’m clarifying our position from this. When we made a recent analysis of the pieces usage, we found that there are some essential pieces used in most of the flows while many others are rarely used.
This means that it will be practically impossible for Activepieces to cover all these individual needs, so here is our mindset here:
Take the top X pieces and make them so powerful and so stable to ensure the majority of our users are having great time.
Focus on utility tools so people would write less code and use a simple UI to get around logistical tasks like formatting, conversion and processing.
Improve our generic tools like HTTP and Webhooks (sometimes with AI) and create great educational material around them so they become more accessible to no-code users.
If we chase the hundred thousands SaaS apps in the market we’ll never be able to achieve a successful mission.
@S_M@Dennis@Bram@Eduardo and all the commenters, your feedback has been awesome, keep it coming and our team will extract the gaps from the post and include what makes sense to our roadmap in our next sprints.
You’ve been all great contributors to Activepieces and we’d love to keep hearing your thoughts and feedback!
I would just like to briefly point out, that helpful documentation and as a backup good customer service are part of the (polished) product, at least in the eye of the end user. That’s why I raised it here.
What I mean is: If I don’t know how to set up a connection, and there is no documentation on it nor help in the forum (which at least back then was the only way to get some kind of support), then I simply cannot use the product. Or I get frustrated and look for another one that works for me.
I really don’t want to start an argument, but I share @Konrod’s confusion, what are you looking for in this thread if not feedback on the polished-ness of the product?
My last comment summarizes my experience so far and lists some of the things that have made me feel the product isn’t polished. Pieces being fragile is a significant gap to a polished product, if pointing that out is not productive, then what are you looking for exactly?
Out of curiosity, what are the popular pieces?
It’s worth keeping in mind survisorship bias here. Such an analysis only includes flows that users were able to set up successfully. If a piece is confusing or unreliable then it’s no surprise that it’s not used as much
I fully agree that a scattershot approach doesn’t work, that’s why I made my argument for quality over quantity
what are you looking for in this thread if not feedback on the polished-ness of the product?
We’re looking for detailed comments about specific features/pages/capabilities on Activepieces that need clear changes to look polished to our existing users.
If you don’t feel you’d like to use Activepieces, or have generic concerns, this puts the feedback, while is welcome, out of the scope of polishing imo.
Out of curiosity, what are the popular pieces?
You can sort pieces by popularity on the Pieces page.
I fully agree that a scattershot approach doesn’t work, that’s why I made my argument for quality over quantity
This is what we’re trying to do now, a year ago, our users wanted quantity, they wanted to see 200 pieces rather than 10, so things are changing quickly and we’re adapting.
The discussion regarding quantity over quality is interesting. A few month (3-4) there were many feature request for new integrations. I have a feeling it dropped a bit recently, which should be fine as this would mean that many integrations have been build.
Looking at the popularity of the pieces, I see #5 HTTP. Interesting here I think would be to check what domains it is linking too, maybe to Webhooks, or maybe some actions which are not there yet, or applications which could be a great addition to the stack. Similar to the Custom API option. It would be great to check the end points and methods to see what users are using but no actions are created for yet.
I think this could steer both items quantity and quality regarding the pieces.
Not sure what the privacy policies and stuff are saying about this btw
Hey @ashrafsam I get that “an unexpected error occurred” error from time to time too, I think it’s piece independent. Happens across a variety of pieces. Not sure what the cause is though. And don’t know what the solution is either, but generally fixes itself after some time, either that, or my haphazard attempts at solutions end up fixing it (maybe lol).
We need auto-save for unpublished versions ASAP. I just deleted a branch thinking it would remove the branch itself, not all of the children and it DELETED everything, except for the trigger. It took me a while to make the flow. I never published it. I don’t even remember how I set it up. Very frustrating. Is there a way I can recover it? @ashrafsam
Have never been more frustrated with AP until today. Almost want to delete my account - emotional reactivity, I know.
There should be a prompt that asks us "Do you want to delete the branch AND all of its children?, OR delete the branch only?
Yes, at the level of current version is perfect. I was trying everything in my power to undo LOL. Also, there is a warning, but it didn’t make it clear that all of the items under the branch would be deleted, so yes something that clarifies that would help. It’s crazy that two clicks could eat hours of my time (maybe more), I don’t remember the set up
Please prioritize this @ashrafsam - it happened now, welp, not the end of the world - but it happening more than once will make this app (AP) more of a liability than an asset. I know it’s largely on me for making a mistake, but we need to add in undo as a failsafe. Thanks!
I hear you and I feel sorry about this. Didn’t you publish any version with these steps in? Also, did you read the confirmation message when it showed up? If you didn’t read it, it won’t be super helpful
