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PowerApps

PowerApps is part of Office 365 and allows users to create business applications a couple of hours. This article shows you how to start learning the basics of PowerApps.
Where do I develop a PowerApp?
PowerApps development is done in PowerApps Studio, which is a downloadable client application or directly inside your browser.

Start with a template …
My recommendation, if you’re just starting, is to create your first PowerApp from one of the templates included in the product. 
At the moment do not worry about how the PowerApp looks like. Just click on the “create” button and pick a template to use in your business environment.


Branding and building for mobile devices
Some applications in the templates section have multiple design modes. In the example of the Estimator Pro PowerApp, there are two design modes; the phone factor and tablet factor.
A phone factor does not mean your PowerApp cannot be displayed on a PC or tablet; it means it will work optimally for a phone.

It is up to the PowerApp designer to choose the design mode, the orientation of the PowerApp and also consider whether the aspect ratio and orientation should be locked.
 
 Next to the “orientation” option, the user can also choose the required “size” of the target device.
 

The PowerApp User interface

The PowerApps interface looks like the following, where each section has its purpose.

 
The first section is the most familiar one: the ribbon. It is available in the PowerApps designer and allows you to achieve the same functionality that is used in Excel or Word. A few examples of what you can do are underlining text, aligning content and setting formulas on the objects.
The most significant thing is that you will have to start thinking about “screens”. These will be shown in the second section. The first screen will be your start screen with subsequent screens displayed in order below each other. To change the order of these screens, simply drag them up or down to your preferred location.
In the third section, your PowerApp screens are displayed. You can use this section to select your controls or to simply drag objects to another location.

In the fourth section, you can define the attributes for the selected control, like in the formula bar. Some attributes can only be selected in this section, for example connecting to your data and picking the correct data layout template.
 Branding your PowerApp
When branding your PowerApps, I recommend that you have a consistent brand and colour. Be sure to set your colour only once (for example on the top bar of the first screen). On the other screens, don’t copy this colour. You should copy the attribute (“fill”) from the first screen’s top bar. Using one value for your colour is how you maintain consistent branding throughout your PowerApp.


The screenshot above shows how to fill a colour, then reference it as follows:


Formulas and Attributes
PowerApps contain many formulas and attributes. Formulas are always coupled with an attribute; attributes are dependent on the object you have selected. It will also have some start handlers like OnHidden; OnStart and OnVisible allowing the execution of some actions like refreshing data sources etc.

Other objects will have different attributes like "OnSelect" where we can define what should happen when the object is clicked.

Objects that allow you to show data will have the attribute Items where you can define your correct data source.

Top 10 Formulas
There are around 150 formulas that you can use with PowerApps, details of which can all be found on Microsoft’s documentation site. The most frequently used have been listed below.
·         If: Determines if an expression evaluates to true.
·         SortByColumns: Allows you to sort a table by one or more columns.
·         Sort: Sorts a table based on a given formula and sort order.
·         SubmitForm: Saves the contents of a form to the underlying data source.
·         Filter: Allows you to filter a set of records based on a given formula.
·         Search: Allows you to search for a set of records based on a given search criteria.
·         UpdateContext: Allows you to store any useful value in a variable which is scoped to the PowerAppsScreen.
·         Set: Similar to UpdateContext only this time the variables stored are globally scoped.
·         Lookup: Finds the first row in a table, matching a specified formula. Returns a single record.
·         ClearCollect: Clears all records from a collection and then adds a different set of records to the same collection.

·         UpdateIf: Update a value if a condition is true.
Connecting to external data
PowerApps has great support to connect to data from other sources. There are already more than one hundred and eighty connectors available. Examples of the most common connectors are shown in the screenshot below:

 
Connecting PowerApp to an on-premises data
By using a gateway it is also possible to leverage data that’s stored in your on-premises. To set up a gateway you will need to use a data source from one of the following:
·          SQL Server
·          SharePoint
·         Oracle
·         Informix
·         Filesystem
·         DB2
Connecting to data in the Common Data Service
PowerApps can use data via a service known as the Common Data Service. The Common Data Service (CDS) for Apps lets you securely store and manage data that’s used by business applications. Data is stored within a set of entities. An entity is a set of records used to store data, similar to how a table stores data within a database.

Use Microsoft flow to enhance PowerApps.
PowerApps also allows you to create mobile applications. Along with your mobile application, you will probably also need some automation to be done in the background. Simple tasks can easily be done in PowerApps, however, when more advanced logic is needed, Microsoft Flow offers more flexibility to handle this.
PowerApps integrates very well with Microsoft Flow, and they make their connection via the PowerApps and Flow buttons, each one allowing the other to be started.




Using PowerApps on a mobile device
To run a PowerApp on your mobile device simply install the PowerApps application via the Google Play Store (for Android devices) or Apple App Store (for Apple devices). The first time you start the PowerApps app, it will ask you to sign in to your organizational account. When this is done, all your company apps will be displayed here. If you have a couple of apps that you use frequently you can add them to your home screen.
The screenshots below are sourced on the Google Play store and give a great example of what a PowerApp looks like on a mobile device.
 

We can access them via your browser.

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