Intuit Partner Platform team blog

Partnerships, IPP + Windows Azure

When we started the Intuit Partner Platform, we had a pretty simple vision: To delight Small Businesses with an ecosystem of applications that solve lots of needs and work extremely well together. We set out to build a platform that would enable us to work with our partners to build more and better offerings for the small business community. 

Although the vision hasn't changed, the path along our journey has certainly evolved. Three years ago, platforms-as-a-service were nascent. To help accelerate our partners getting to market, we created and offered an end-to-end platform. This helped a number of our partners get to market, but it wasn't a perfect offering. It was a stack that solved the needs of a small set developers, but couldn't scale in features to meet the needs of all our developers.

While we've continued to invest in our native platform, other platforms have moved at lightning speed. Many of these platforms focus on what I'll call the "lower" end of the stack. This is the stuff a developer needs to build and deploy a saas or mobile app (hardware, database, etc.). These platforms have evolved way past anything we could create and honestly provide a better development experience than we could.

In parallel however, we've focused on our core assets and differentiators, and evolved the "upper" end of the stack. This includes access to QuickBooks data and key "go-to-market" services that make app integrations possible and delight small businesses. As you can see with our Beta release of Intuit Anywhere, we're continuing to push the envelope on providing ubiquitous data integrations and tightly integrated apps to our customers. That's what we're good at, and it's where we will focus now and in the future.

That brings me to a couple of announcements we shared at IPP CloudJam: First, we will no longer offer our "native development" stack for developers to build on. We are going to focus our resources on the top of the stack and make data and services for our developers the top priority.

So what should our developers who are looking for a PaaS offering do?

While we have always been and will always be an open platform, and we will always embrace applications built on any platform, we think it's important to help guide our developers who are looking for a PaaS option to what we believe is the best option on the market. So I'm pleased to announce that we will continue the journey we started with Microsoft last year and double down on our investment to tightly integrate the Windows Azure platform with IPP. The feedback from current developers using Azure and live on Intuit App Center has been extremely positive and we believe with additional investment in our Windows Azure SDK for IPP, we can make developing an app on Azure, leveraging Quickbooks data and IPP's go-to-market services, and getting into the Intuit App Center Channel, DROP DEAD EASY.

We've been extremely impressed with the dedication and quality of Microsoft's platform, their willingness to work closely with our existing partners, and their dedication to making developers successful. Microsoft has built a huge business behind their partner community – they just "get" how important partners are and how to treat them – and with our "native" IPP development option now gone, we think this is the best platform for our developers.

Read up Liz Ngo, Microsoft's business development manager on why we're doubling down on this partnership. 

Here is some more information on how developers can take advantage of our partnership, sign up for Front Runner for IPP. 

Look for new releases of Window Azure SDK for IPP in the coming months and if you have requests, feedback, or interest in learning more about Azure, please let us know!

Alex Chriss
Director, Intuit Partner Platfomr

Intuit Anywhere Beta - come and get it!

Today, we're very excited to share with you that Intuit Anywhere is now in Beta, meaning you can get a hold of the bits and access the services to start integrating them into your SaaS apps.

 We’re obviously very excited with Intuit Anywhere and to now be at a place where we can share Beta with you - we truly believe that Intuit Anywhere will create brand new opportunities for our partners and awesome new experiences for our customers.

This morning, we walked through an example use case, involving MethodCRM, Mavenlink, Freshbooks and Bill.com. We showed how Intuit Anywhere was acting as the glue across these apps, letting the data flow from one app to the other, flowing into and out of QuickBooks: there was customer data being written and estimates being created in the CRM app, finding their way into QuickBooks Online, then the that same information being read in by another 3rd app - Mavenlink in this case - to create work items and deliverables, which can then later be used by other apps to invoice customer (such as Freshbooks) and bill and pay vendors (via Bill.com).

The walkthrough showed how all this allowed the customer to save time and money by avoiding double data entry, using multiple apps that work together - and doing so at the developer's sites, not through Intuit App Center - that's a really important point about Intuit Anywhere: we want to make IPP's data services available to apps without those apps having to be fully Federated into IPP...

The bluedot widget

We showed how the "bluedot widget" allows navigation across the Intuit Anywhere connected apps, and how it enabled a Single-Sign-On experience across the Intuit Anywhere apps.

We also showed how Intuit App Center acts as the destination where the customer is able to control which apps they've granted permissions to connect to their dats, and how they can control that access, revoking access as necessary.

All awesome time-saving features that developers can integrate into their apps and in turn offer to their own customers quickly and easily.

We demonstrated how Intuit Anywhere was acting as the glue across these different apps.

Then the Bill.com team showed a live demo of Intuit Anywhere that they have rolled out to a some of their customers as part of the early-adoption program. They also shared the customer feedback - all very positive feedback, really validating the value we're delivering to to developers and customers. It was awesome!

That was the customer facing story.

We then had the product team demonstrate how quickly and easily IPP developers can integrate Intuit Anywhere into their apps and get the data flowing between their apps and IPP data services APIs. All real bits, real services - they got an app integrated in minutes, real-time in front of the developer audience.

And you can get going yourself right now!

Before you head off and review the docs, here are a couple of very important pieces of info we shared this morning at IPP CloudJam since our initial announcement a few weeks back:

Intuit Anywhere - Pricing:

For each Intuit Anywhere connection, Intuit charges the developer $5 per company connected per month. There is no limit on the number of users – so an app that is connected to a company file can be used by multiple users.

Also, we’re not putting limits on how and if the developer want to charge customers for leveraging the Intuit Anywhere feature. Developers can choose to include the cost as part of their standard pricing, or pass the cost on to the customer as a monthly feature, or  add their own margin, so for example, charge the customer $10 per month, retain $5 and pass $5 to Intuit.

We want to keep this pricing as simple as possible and give developers the choice around the economic opportunities here.

Intuit Anywhere - Timing:

Today you'll be able to access a pre-release version of the bits and services you need to integrate the Intuit Anywhere experience and data into your app.

We plan to make the first set of Intuit Anywhere integrations available to end-customers in late September, with a phased roll-out of other Intuit Anywhere connected apps on a “First Ready / First to Go Live” basis.

Intuit Anywhere - Types of Apps Supported

Eventually (as the name suggests!), we want to make Intuit Anywhere available for all types of apps and services, and across every device.

To start with, we’re focused on enabling web-based SaaS apps that are sold to multiple customers – if you have a mobile extension for your SaaS app – that works too.

Over time, we’ll add support for custom apps and integration: examples are one-off integrations between QuickBooks and ERP systems, or other “behind the firewall” integrations. Stand-alone mobile and iPad apps and "desktop" applications won't be supported in the first instance, but we plan to. We don’t have a timescale to share for these, but if you are planning to use Intuit Anywhere for custom, mobile-only or desktop apps, we definitely want to hear from you and will update you once we have a roadmap to share.

--

So, you can get going and start your integrations today. The team has worked very hard to make sure that the developer experience is quick and as simple as possible – the reality is that the grunt of the work developers will need to do will take place around the integration of the data into their app. If you've already begun this data integration - then that's great: Intuit Anywhere is using the exact same data service APIs that are live today on IPP, just using OAuth, so any work on the data integration will be totally ready to go when we go live with Intuit Anywhere.

As you can imagine, the developer experience is a top priority for us - we want to make it as quick and simple as it can possibly be.

And we want the customer experience to be awesome too - we want customers to trust the that the Intuit Anywhere experience will be secure and "just work", so each integration needs to meet technical requirements and pass a security assessment prior to going live.

Lastly, the point of the Beta is to learn and get your feedback, so we very much look forward to hearing from you as you start your Intuit Anywhere integrations.

So...if you like the sound of Intuit Anywhere, come and play with the Beta!

-

Alex Barnett
Group Manager, Developer Relations

Announcing IPP Support for QuickBooks Online - Open Beta

It's been a while coming, but we're very excited to announce that the Intuit Partner Platform is now well on the way to expanding its support beyond the QuickBooks Desktop product to also support QuickBooks Online.

Today, the IPP Intuit Data Services for QuickBooks Online API is now available as an open beta for all developers building applications on IPP, and you will be able to start selling your QBO-integrated IPP apps through the Intuit App Center by January 2011.

About the QuickBooks Online Customer Base

Intuit’s small business customer base is increasingly moving online to manage their front and back office functions. Intuit has seen this trend firsthand with the impressive growth of QuickBooks Online. In one year, QuickBooks Online has doubled their customer base...and 80% of these customers have not previously used QuickBooks Desktop.

As an IPP developer you now have the opportunity to provide additional value through building applications that integrate with QuickBooks Online (QBO) data, filling key customer needs and providing great solutions to Intuit's fast growing QBO customer base.

We'll be driving a ton of users to your apps: with one click, a QuickBooks Online user will be able to immediately access (try and buy) a list of IPP apps that specifically integrate with QBO data - all while using their existing QBO username and password.

Benefits of Early Adoption

Our main PR launch is currently scheduled for January 2011. Get in early to be part of this exciting launch which will include direct access to our QuickBooks Online customers through in-product links.

As an early adopter of IPP's Intuit Data Services (IDS) for QBO API, you’ll also help shape our development roadmap. We’re very interested in learning what you need as we expand and evolve our offering.

We’re very interested in your feedback on documentation, the data objects you'd like supported, and API functionality. Discuss feedback at the IPP forum.

About the API

Many IPP developers are already familiar with the Intuit Data Services API that supports the QuickBooks Desktop data model. For QBO, we're following the same REST-based, broad data model, however there are some key differences.  Over time, we aim to make these differences even smaller.

The initial set of objects we have in the beta today are those that we plan to be in the final V1 release, and each today have full CRUD operations. These objects are:

• Account
• Bill
• BillPayment
• CashPurchase
• Check
• CreditCardCharge
• Customer
• Employee
• Estimate
• Invoice
• Item
• PaymentMethod
• SalesTerm
• Vendor

Filters and Sorts are available for each, see docs for details.

How to get more info on the open beta:

• Review the IPP Intuit Data Services (IDS) for QBO API documentation
• Attend the IPP IDS QBO API overview webinar (Friday, Oct 8, 2010 10AM-11AM PDT) - Register here
• Meet with the IPP team - Sign up for the IPP CloudJam at Intuit's offices, Nov 17-18 2010, Mountain View, CA - (We’ll be doing sessions on the QBO API).  Tickets are limited (we only have 25 left) so register asap.  

Thanks,
The Intuit Partner Platform Team

Ruby web apps and the Intuit Partner Platform

Editor's note: The following is a guest post by Zack Chandler who has been active in the Ruby on Rails and Intuit developer community for a number of years.

As recently as five years ago the majority of developers considered the Ruby programming language arcane and obscure. Then the Ruby on Rails web framework burst on the scene and seemly overnight became a must-consider choice when building web apps.

I began working with Ruby on Rails before the 1.0 release and have been amazed at the progress of the framework and growth of the community. Not long after that I began developing integrations between Ruby web apps and QuickBooks via the QuickBooks Web Connector and QuickBooks Online via the QBO API.

New to the QuickBooks ecosystem, I quickly learned there were additional benefits beyond simply adding the “QuickBooks integration” checkbox on a feature tour. Specifically the QuickBooks Marketplace quickly proved itself to be a valuable channel for lead-generation.

Fast-forward to 2010 and Ruby developers have even greater reason to be excited with Intuit’s current integration opportunities.

Ruby web apps apps targeting small to medium-sized businesses are launching daily. Humm… guess which accounting system most small to medium-sized businesses use (hint: rhymes with “fast cooks”)?

Meanwhile Intuit has re-imagined their entire developer offering and launched the ambitious Intuit Partner Platform. To a Ruby developer with no former experience with QuickBooks integration I would simply say that the most exciting parts of IPP are:

• Intuit Data Services - a cloud-based API for QuickBooks data
• Intuit Workplace App Center - an online portal where your web app can be marketed and sold to millions of Intuit customers

I recently did a deep-dive into IPP and came away thoroughly excited. I’ve posted a quickstart tutorial entitled Intuit Partner Platform for Ruby Web Applications on my Depixelate blog which will hopefully help other Rubyists get started with IPP.

The future is indeed bright for those Ruby developers wishing to both co-market and integrate with Intuit data through the cloud.

Windows Azure SDK 1.0 for Intuit Partner Platform Now Available!

As part of recent joint announcement by Intuit and Microsoft, we released a beta version of the Windows Azure SDK 1.0 for Intuit Partner Platform - a set of tools, code samples and services designed to make it easy for developers of SaaS applications developed on Windows Azure to federate those SaaS apps on to IPP and sell them to millions of Intuit customers in the Intuit Workplace App Center.

So What's New?

I'm pleased to announce that version 1.0 is now available for download (if you are already a project member you can get the source code directly at code.intuit.com). So, what's new in 1.0? The main change is the support for Intuit Data Services (IDS) that makes it easy for developers to program against customers' QuickBooks within their applications. We've also included an IDS-integrated sample app to help you along.

Get Started with the Windows Azure SDK for IPP
Here developers will find documentation with the steps to host an application on Windows Azure and federate it in to the Intuit Partner Platform. The document provides step by step instructions to get the requisite accounts, create the project for the hosted service, program against IDS, and finally, to federate the web application in to Intuit Workplace. Additionally, the document also provides the steps to configure the SAML Gateway’s endpoints for SSL.

View the Azure Documentation.

Happy Coding

-Jarred

IPP - Alterity's Story: From the Desktop to SaaS

It’s always exciting when a new app goes live on the Intuit Workplace App Center, and especially so when it is has been developed by a long-standing member of the Intuit Developer Network.

Brian Sweat of Alterity had good conversation (full recording as an mp3 here) with Redmonk’s Michael Coté to talk about the new Easy Analytics for Inventory, and why - as a 10-year-long member of IDN developing "traditional" desktop applications - Alterity is adopting IPP and the SaaS delivery model for the next generation of its products that integrate with customers' QuickBooks data.

Show Notes:

• Brian tells us about Alterity and their new offering, Easy Analytics for Inventory.
• I ask Brian to tell us how they started getting interested in using IPP and what the process was like getting up and running.
• We talk about the use of Flex and how the IPP platform integrates with the UI layer.
• Brian tells us about the ability to more closely track what users are actually using and doing (or not using) in a cloud-based application.
• While customers don’t seem to be overly concerned with cloud vs. desktop deployment – at this early point – Brain says the support and even install time on cloud seems much smaller than for traditional deployment options.
• This leads to a discussion about the other effects a PaaS, like IPP, has on a company’s structure: namely not having to worry so much about billing and other back-office concerns. And then there’s all the marketing Intuit does for them in the App Center.

The full recording as an mp3 here.

Intuit Partner Platform + Windows Azure = Win for Small Businesses

When we started the Intuit Partner Platform (IPP) last year, we envisioned a destination where Small Businesses could pick from a variety of quality applications to solve their critical business pain points – and we wanted those apps to work together!  A big ecosystem of Apps – from a variety of developers and pre-integrated – solving for the needs of Small Businesses.

Today, we’re thrilled to announce an alliance between Intuit and Microsoft, that brings IPP a giant step closer to our ecosystem vision. Starting today, SaaS developers can access the beta of the Windows Azure SDK for IPP - a set of tools, code samples, and services, designed to make it easy for developers of SaaS applications developed on Windows Azure to federate those SaaS apps on to IPP and sell them to millions of Small Businesses in the Intuit Workplace App Center.

Today’s news about Intuit and Microsoft’s relationship has two converging themes:

1) More developers + great tools = more great apps for small businesses

• The Windows Azure SDK for IPP (when fully delivered) will enable developers to build a great application on the Windows Azure platform while leveraging the go-to-market services (i.e. single sign-on, billing and data web API’s, user management, etc.) of IPP and publish their app to an existing marketplace in the Intuit App Center.
• In addition to the third-party developer apps, Microsoft will also be working closely with us to offer their Business Productivity Online Suite (BPOS) via the Intuit Workplace App Center.  While it will take a little while to get the integration just right, we think the addition of BPOS, to the Intuit Apps, and third party apps, creates a strong suite of apps for Small Businesses to choose from.

2) Broader channels = more customers for developers

• By reaching out to our respective Channel partners (VAR’s, Solution Providers, etc.) and introducing them to the Intuit App Center, we further expand the ecosystem of Small Businesses that developers can target. Through our product channels (via QuickBooks) and our partner channels, we have an opportunity to build a large customer base using connected applications.

The reason we’re so excited about this alliance is very simple: More Quality Apps + More Targeted Customers = Vibrant Ecosystem (and a strong network effect)!  By joining the development and channel forces of two of the leaders in the Small Business Market, I think we have a great opportunity to delight SMB’s, Developers, and VAR’s. Win-Win-Win!

Alex Chriss
Director, Intuit Partner Platform

IPP Podcast Now Available by Michael Cote (RedMonk) and Jeff Collins

This new RIA Weekly podcast talks about what IPP is, and the opportunity it represents for developers.

Enjoy!

Announcing IPP V2.4 - More Than More Data!

The IPP team is excited to announce that IPP v2.4 is now live and available for IPP partners. Take advantage of the new and enhanced capabilities: access to more data, new configuration options for application Sign Up and Sign In (including more control over application invitation messaging), and additional click-stream analytics.

Read all about it below. (Additionally, we’re offering a webinar on January 14th that will cover the IPP v2.4 features in depth. Note: You must be registered IPP Developer to attend this webinar.)

IPP v2.4 CONTENTS

IPP v2.4 is part of a series of platform updates focused on:

1. Extending the IPP Intuit Data Services (IDS) model for IPP federated and native platform developers, including Read (and in some cases Create and Update) access to Accounts Payable, and General Ledger objects as well as several new Account Receivable and List items
2. Streamlining the application Sign-up / Sign-in (S·U·S·I) experience
3. Improving click stream analytics to help partners run their business, and
4. AppCenter enhancements to improve the application shop and learn experience

We’ve also addressed a variety of platform and IDS issues / defects in v2.4.

1. INTUIT DATA SERVICES (IDS) ENHANCEMENTS 

We’ve made a significant number of enhancements and improvements to Intuit Data Services.

Important: IPP v2.4 introduces a new IDS API version, v2. Developers need to use this new IDS API version to utilize the new objects / behaviors listed below. Previous IDS versions (e.g. v1) are supported but will not include new objects/behaviors; developers are strongly urged to migrate to the latest API version (v2) at their earliest convenience. IPP will continue to support IDS v1 until December 1, 2010.

The following capabilities have been exposed via REST API as well as added to the IPP Flex framework:
New IDS Objects

• ACCOUNTS PAYABLE
  • Read and Create access to Item Receipts
  • Read access to Purchase Orders, Bills, Bill Payment Checks, Bill Payment Credit Card, Sales Tax Payment Checks and Vendor Credits and Checks
• ACCOUNTS RECEIVABLE
  • Read access to Credit Memos and Statement Charges
  • Read access to Sales Receipts
• GENERAL LEDGER
  • Read and Create access to General Journal entries
• LISTS
  • Read, Create and Update access to Jobs
  • Customer/Job hierarchy properly represented
  • Read access to Payment methods, Sales tax codes, ship methods, Inventory items, inventory assemblies, classes and units of measure
  • Item Query now returns any of several types of QuickBooks items
• OTHER
  • Read access to Checks, Sales Receipts, Purchase Orders, Journal Entries, and Company Classes

Enhanced IDS Objects

• Accounts, Inventory items, Inventory assemblies, service items and non-inventory items can now be Created
• Customers, Employees and Vendors can be filtered by name and company name
• Most transactions now support “To be Printed” and “To Be Emailed” attributes

Read more about these enhancements in the release notes.

Get more detailed information about all the IDS capabilities in the IDS Programmer’s Guide.

Register for the webinar we’re offering on January 14th that will cover the IPP v2.4 features in depth.

2. STREAMLINED INTUIT WORKPLACE APP CENTER SIGN-IN/SIGN-UP (S·U·S·I) EXPERIENCE 

Several improvements and additional developer configuration options have been added to the Sign-up / Sign-in experience for Intuit Workplace App Center.

Note: All changes are upwardly compatible. New developer-facing enhancements are optionally configurable. 

The end-user changes to make the SUSI process clearer and easier will be immediately available for new users signing up for Intuit Workplace App Center applications.

Enhancements include:

• Custom Welcome and Application Invitation emails: partners can create their own email templates.
• Guided sign-up process with improved sign-in interface and client-side field validation throughout process
• Improved business profile interface that (a) prevents users from subscribing to an app more than once per business and (b) allows customer to launch existing subscriptions as well as add new ones.

Get more information about these and other new IPP SUSI capabilities here. 

3. CLICK-STREAM ANALYTICS IMPROVEMENTS 

Several enhancements have been added to IPP’s click-stream tracking services based on Google Analytics. These include:

• Separate sign-in tracking to differentiate actions performed by new customers signing up for applications versus existing customers signing in to their apps.
• New click-stream tracking for customers who are upgrading their subscription from beta, opt-in trials, or subscription upgrade/downgrades.

Get more information on these and other new IPP Click-stream analytics capabilities here. 

4. INTUIT WORKPLACE APP CENTER IMPROVEMENTS 

A variety of small enhancements and modifications have been made to Intuit Workplace AppCenter to improve the overall shopping flow and experience. 

5. SOFTWARE UPDATES / FIXES 

For a complete list of software updates / fixes included in IPP v2.4, please review the release notes here. 

Thanks,
—The Intuit Partner Platform Team

Sleeter Group: IPP - What It Means for Intuit Consulting Communities

The Sleeter Group has published the second article of a two part series focusing on the Intuit Partner Platform (IPP).

The first article compared the IPP and the "traditional" QuickBooks SDK. This second article explains the IPP offering, how developers can take advantage of it, and what it means to the Sleeter Group and Intuit consulting communities.

The Sleeter Group is a respected community of experts who provide consulting services to small business owners in the accounting software and business process design areas. So we're pretty excited about this active community taking an interest in and educating their membership about IPP!

• Part I: What is the IPP - and how does it compare to the SDK?
• Part II:What IPP means to the Sleeter Group and Intuit consulting communities