Customization & The Layer Principle ("Everything is an App")
A core architectural concept of Niksphere is: Everything is an App.
Every customization—whether a minor UI tweak or a major enterprise extension—is technically structured as a lightweight "Delta-App" that declares a dependency on a base application. These apps stack as transparent layers on top of each other and merge at runtime into the final user experience.
The 4 Customization Layers
- Base Layer: The original, complete core applications containing base entities, pages, and logic.
- Company Layer: Organization-wide customizations (e.g., custom entities, global field additions, company workflows).
- Department Layer: Department-specific UI adjustments and view permissions configured by department leads.
- User Layer: Individual user personalizations (e.g., hiding/moving fields, custom column sorting).
Adaptation Approaches: No-Code, Low-Code, Pro-Code
Niksphere supports different customization tiers depending on user expertise:
- No-Code: Visually adjust UI elements directly in the browser (hide/show fields, rearrange navigation menus). Requires no technical knowledge.
- Low-Code: Technicians and key-users customize YAML configuration files in built-in editors to overlay new pages, fieldsets, and entities on top of base applications.
- Pro-Code: Software developers create full applications in VS Code, writing complex business logic in Pascal and building custom microservice integrations.