Welcome to Ontraport for no-code web apps. Maybe you want to run your business on a full web app. Or maybe you just need a blog, an online course, or a tool for your team. This course shows you how to build it in Ontraport, without writing code.
This is an advanced course. You don't need to be a coder, but you should be comfortable with forms, the page builder, automations, and adding fields with the field editor. If any of those are new to you, review them first.
First, you'll learn what makes a web app different from a website. A web app shows each visitor their own content, and it does five things. It lets people add data, stores and connects that data, processes it, controls who can see it, and displays it. Ontraport has a tool for each one. Forms, imports and the API add data. Objects, fields and relationships store and connect it. Automations, webhooks and the API process it. User permissions and membership site logins control access. And the Dynamic CMS displays it.
Then you'll tour the App Marketplace. Click your profile icon, then Apps, to turn on ready-made apps like Blogs, Courses and Lessons, Forums and Knowledge Base. Each app adds the custom objects it needs.
Apps, custom objects, dynamic pages and dynamic blocks all need a Dynamic CMS package. The account owner adds one from the Account Details page. Each package sets limits on how many custom objects and records you can have.
Custom objects are the heart of this course. They're record types you design to hold your app's data, like Pets or Projects. You'll learn the three relationship types: one-to-one, one-to-many and many-to-many. For example, a company has many contacts. And an event has many registrants, while each contact can register for many events.
You'll create your own objects under your profile icon, then Administration, Data, and Custom Objects. You'll see why Contacts is a special object, since it's the record type your other objects usually relate to.
And you'll build forms that fill in more than one record at a time, like a deal form that also updates the related contact.
Relationships are what make an app personal. Picture a favorite button on a listing site. When a visitor clicks the heart, Ontraport adds a relationship between that visitor and the listing. To show their favorites, you list every listing that's related to them. You'll learn the ways to add and remove relationships: right on a record, from automations, and with Reaction buttons that logged-in members click to like, favorite or upvote.
Finally, the Dynamic CMS, where you present your data. A dynamic template is one design that becomes a page for every record, like one layout for all your blog posts. Dynamic blocks list many records on one page, like related articles or available courses, with your choice of sorting and conditions.
Page types set the web address for each page, and you can publish pages for existing and new records automatically.
You'll also learn to keep private data private, by showing pages only to logged-in members, and only showing members the pages for their own records.
And if you know HTML and CSS, dynamic list HTML gives you more design freedom for repeating lists. It's available on some Dynamic CMS plans.
Along the way, you'll see how common app features come together, like signing in, searching and sorting, favoriting, and letting people update their own details. So: learn the five functions, model your data with custom objects and relationships, and present it with the Dynamic CMS. Next up: what a web application is, and how it differs from a website.