Elemento

Preview - releasing mid-2020

Elemento is a radical new approach to creating software.

It lets you build the systems you need in hours or days rather than weeks or months.

Dynamic websites, apps to help your customers, or custom solutions to your admin problems - all at a lower cost than you ever thought possible.

You can learn to use it yourself. Instead of writing code, you just answer simple questions about your business. It's about as easy as using a spreadsheet.

Or you can ask one of our friendly consultants to work with you. They will help you build a solution that is just right for your business.

Either way, Elemento itself is free for you to use, and always will be.

Run your software on your own computers, or in the cloud.

See how Elemento can help you
She could be an Elemento user

How Elemento Can Help You

You may work by yourself, or in a large organisation. You may use software yourself, or sell products to others.

Whatever you do, Elemento can help you create the software you or your customers need.

In less time and for less money than you ever thought possible.

Small businesses

Your business is unique, but you're probably trying to bend standard software to fit. Elemento can help you build the systems that fit your business perfectly.

Or maybe you want to provide a specialised service online, but you don't think you could afford it. Elemento may bring it within reach.

Charities

Your budgets are tight, but that just means you need to do even more with less.

Elemento may be able to help your hard-pressed staff squeeze a bit more out of each day.

IT departments

Elemento can reduce cost, time-to-market and risks in your next development project. Our consultants can give you a flying start and make sure your developers are completely up to speed to carry it forward.

Even if you have to stick with corporate standards, a prototype created with Elemento could make sure you build exactly what your users need and act as a reference for testing.

Accountants

Earn extra revenue and make your clients love you by building custom software to make their businesses run more efficiently.

Train your own staff to build software with Elemento, or partner with our consultancy services - the choice is yours.

If you work with Xero, we are planning a range of Elemento building blocks that connect to the Xero API.

Web designers

When your clients need something more than a static site, Elemento is right there to bridge the gap.

And it's far quicker and easier than other web development technologies.

Give it a try - and if you want a friendly guide during the work, our consultants will be happy to work with you.

Software product suppliers

You're probably working hard to differentiate your product from others in your market.

How about a killer USP? Every customer can customise their instance of your application to suit their business precisely - or get it done for them at low cost.

We can work with you to make that possible, by creating Elemento building blocks that work with your API.

Or maybe you're launching a new application or looking to refresh an existing one - get it to market in a fraction of the time with Elemento.

Use Elemento yourself Our custom development service

Use Elemento Yourself

We want to empower everyone to create their own software,
using a simple but powerful tools designed for people, not programmers.

Ever thought you could build your own software?

Programming is hard.

It takes years to learn.

I'm no good at anything like that.

Most programming languages are designed by techies, for techies. But what if it didn't have to be like that? What if you could build your own software - apps, websites, tools for your work - or just a catalogue for your teapot collection?

Elemento lets you do that. If you can use a word processor or set up a spreadsheet, you can get started in a few minutes, make something useful in a few hours, and produce your first serious app in a few days.

You still need to think about what you want to achieve and decide how to get there. But that's the same with anything worthwhile: writing an essay, building a piece of furniture, cooking a meal, planning an event. If you can do something like that, you can create software with Elemento.

How Elemento works

With Elemento there is no need to learn a weird coding language.

You just need to define simple facts about:

  • the things your system deals with - customers, orders, bookings, etc
  • the actions people can do with those things
  • what views you want to see for each of the things
  • the business rules of your system - expressed as simple formulas, like in a spreadsheet

No magic, no secrets

Elemento is open source, free to use and actually quite simple inside.

The facts you define get turned into straightforward code that will run by itself, and that any JavaScript programmer can understand and maintain directly.

So you're not locked in, and even if all of our people are abducted by aliens, you will still be able to use your Elemento software.

Learn Elemento

We will soon be releasing the tools and a range of training courses to help you get up to speed with Elemento quickly and easily.

Subscribe to our mailing list to find out as soon as they are launched.

Keep in touch

Custom Development Service

Elemento is simple to learn and use yourself if you want to. But you may want some guidance for more complex needs. Or you and your staff may just not have the time to spare.

That's where our unique consultancy and development service comes in. It's friendly, straightforward, fast and amazingly effective.

We actually develop the software right there in front of you - no misunderstandings, no wasted time

And it comes with a unique guarantee: if we don't build what you want, you don't pay.

We listen

Our motto is:

"We love to listen"

And that's what we'll do, all the way.

You won't have to deal with pushy salespeople. When you contact us, you will speak directly to one of our consultants. They will listen to your needs, make suggestions, and then just leave the decision with you.

We get down to business

We don't want to spend ages writing proposals and negotiating contracts. That's just dead time. And hidden costs passed on to you.

So we have a unique approach. We actually start work on your software instead of writing a big dry document. We aim to give you at least one useful part of your system in one week. You only pay if we build what you need. Simple as that.

No big commitment. No lock-in. Just the most efficient way to develop the software you need without spending any more than necessary.

But we need you

To provide this unique service, we have to work closely with you and your staff throughout.

We will need someone who knows the business, and can make decisions, to work with our consultant for at least an hour each day.

This joint responsibility is a serious commitment, but the benefit to you is knowing how the project is going and what you are going to get at all times. No going off track, no unpleasant surprises.

That's got to be better than sending programmers off to work on their own for weeks and then finding what they have built is not really what you wanted.

And there is no risk

At the end of each week, you review what you and your consultant have created and decide whether it is useful. You can either pay for the software and keep it, or just leave it there - entirely up to you.

Many projects will be complete in a week. If yours needs longer, just schedule more week-long blocks, all with the same guarantee as the first.

It's simple, quick, risk-free and efficient. And that means much lower costs for you.

Find out how this could work for you

Get ready to create

We are using a private beta of Elemento ourselves to develop software right now.

The public release will be in mid 2019.

Training courses will follow soon after.

Join our mailing list to get the latest news about Elemento.

Development Guides

Would you like to find out how we could work with you to develop your software?

Anything else you would like to know?

Email paulb@ashridgetech.com and we'll get right back to you.

Why we are doing this

by Paul Boocock, Principal Consultant

Elemento is being developed by my company, Ashridge Technologies.

I've been involved in dozens of software projects, large and small, over the last 30 years. And throughout all of them, there has been one question at the back of my mind:

Why does it take so long - and cost so much - to turn a simple idea in someone's head into working software?

I now believe there are two main reasons:

Programming languages reflect the way computers work, not the way people think about things

Programmers live in a different world to the people who use the software

So we are going to change that with Elemento.

We are going to enable everyone in the world to have the software they need for business, education or use at home.

Anyone will be able to learn to create software themselves if they want to.

And if you are a software professional, you will be able to work many times faster. So you can build applications working alongside your customer, eliminating misunderstandings. And reducing costs to a fraction of traditional methods.

What will you create with Elemento?