r/PowerApps

This is for a Canvas App in PowerApps for Teams

I am working on a screen where the user:

1. Pastes a text string (sample paragraph from a report) into a box and adds line breaks so that each line is either static text to keep, or a string to replace with a looked-up value.
2. A button press splits the text and collects it into a collection where each record is numbered and contains the text from one of the lines. Fields in this collection are Sequence, Text, LookedUpRecord (default blank/null), and UseLookup (default False)
3. (currently stuck on this step) In a gallery displaying these records, user can select a lookup value from a dropdown inside the gallery template which points to a dataverse table. The dropdown's OnChange property changes the records UseLookup value to True, and sets the LookedUpRecord to the dropdown record.
4. These records will be written to a TextFragments Dataverse table and can be Concat-ed together to form a sentence like "{static text} {looked-up text} {static text} {looked-up text} {static text}", where the looked-up values would point to a project data point.

At least that is the idea. When I create the collection in step number 2, the LookedUpRecord value needs to be blank, but I cannot figure out how to define a collection field as a record or even a GUID if it has to start out blank. PowerApps seems to assume that it will be text, and the Patch function is unable to assign a lookup to it. I've tried {LookedUpField: Blank()} and {LookedUpField:""}

I think if I go ahead and write the TextFragment records to the dataverse table (instead of the temporary collection) in step 2, then the problem would clear up, but I would like to avoid that, since editing each of the records would (I assume) trigger a rewrite, and I want to be able to edit the source text more freely before writing to the table. And then create all the records at once.

Does that make sense? Can someone suggest how to force a collection field to be a looked-up record type, but still leaving it blank? Any other comments are welcome, too. Thanks!

As title says, i want to give PL-200 this month, considering it will be retiring in Aug. is it worth taking ?

A milestone I'm really proud of.

One of the enterprise solutions built by our small 3-member team using PowerApps, Power Automate, Dynamics 365 CRM, Azure Functions, and REST APIs was part of a project that was ultimately sold in a $1.1M USD deal.

It's a great reminder that Power Platform isn't just for simple internal apps, it can power enterprise-grade solutions that create real business value.

I'm grateful for every project that allows us to solve complex business problems through automation.

What has been your biggest PowerApps project so far?

In my company, I’m pretty locked down when it comes to access rights.

Right now, I can only use canvas apps. I can’t use code apps or vibe.

My need is to create an app that lets employees place orders for office supplies, which would then feed a SharePoint list and a Power BI dashboard to track the status of each order.

The app would also include an attachment viewer and allow users to upload attachments. It would function like a mini e-commerce site, with a list of items and a shopping cart.

Is it worth building the whole thing in canvas?

i never have a problem like this before, since i always make app on my own.
but, lately i have a project that needs to be co-author.
now ever since, everytime my co-author changing something, and i open the project with my home PC.
All formula is changing from comma to dot
example :
from (RGB 255, 0, 0, 0) now (RGB 255. 0. 0. 0.)

how to make sure the format are not changing?

when i work alone, i can use my office laptop and working in my home pc just fine.

Hi everyone, I work at a large enterprise and we are trying to build a content management app for our sales team to have easy viewing and click through a library of sales collateral. Ideally something like scrollable and searchable and connected to sharepoint files on the backend, mostly PPTs. A set of admins maintain control over version control and you can easy combine files and download or move into another folder without changing the originals. A lot like Seismic or Highspot (our legal team has qualms with their AI terms). Would appreciate any help!

Situation: A Power Apps application built on a SharePoint list exceeding 500,000 records was experiencing app load times of 60+ seconds, degrading usability for a large (2,000+) user base.

Task: Diagnose and resolve the performance bottleneck without introducing premium licensing costs, which were cost-prohibitive at that user scale.

Action: Used Power Apps Monitor to trace network calls at the API level, uncovering that a compound filter on two indexed SharePoint columns was seeding its query from the wrong index — forcing SharePoint to page through the list in ~5,000-row chunks, issuing 100+ sequential API calls (most returning zero matching rows) before returning a result. Reordered the filter's condition sequence so the query seeded from the more selective indexed column instead.

Result: Reduced the query from 100+ API calls (~25 seconds of network time) to 1 call (~200ms) — a 99%+ reduction in query time, cutting overall app load time from 60+ seconds to near-instant, with zero schema changes and no added infrastructure cost.

Before:

Filter(
    'MyList',
    TextColumn = varID,
    DateColumn >= Today(),
    DateColumn < DateAdd(Today(), 1, Days)
)
// Result: 100+ sequential API calls, ~25s

After:

Filter(
    'MyList',
    DateColumn >= Today(),
    DateColumn < DateAdd(Today(), 1, Days),
    TextColumn = varID
)
// Result: 1 API call, ~200ms

Beta tester: "there's a bug in the app"

Me: "why would use it like that?"

Building the desired functionality isn't bad. It's trying to find all the ways someone might misuse it and prevent them from fucking up their own work that's difficult.

Problem:
I have a collection that is a table with values:

ClearCollect(
    colFieldTemplate,
    Table(
        {FIELD_ID: 1, FIELD_SLOT:"REF_STR1", FIELD_TYPE:"STRING", FIELD_LABEL:"", ENABLE:false, MANDATORY_FLG: false},
        {FIELD_ID: 2, FIELD_SLOT:"REF_STR2", FIELD_TYPE:"STRING", FIELD_LABEL:"", ENABLE:false, MANDATORY_FLG: false},
        {FIELD_ID: 3, FIELD_SLOT:"REF_STR3", FIELD_TYPE:"STRING", FIELD_LABEL:"", ENABLE:false, MANDATORY_FLG: false},
        {FIELD_ID: 4, FIELD_SLOT:"REF_STR4", FIELD_TYPE:"STRING", FIELD_LABEL:"", ENABLE:false, MANDATORY_FLG: false}
    )
);

I then have a SQL table with some data:

INPUT_ID	FIELD_ID	FIELD_SLOT	FIELD_TYPE	FIELD_LABEL
1	1	REF_STR1	STRING	TEST
1	2	REF_STR2	STRING	TEST2
1	3	REF_STR3	STRING	TEST3

Now, on a button press, I want to update my colFieldTemplate with data from my SQL table - especially "FIELD_LABEL".

ClearCollect(
    colInputSetup,
    Filter(
        MyTable,
        INPUT_ID = Value(drp_setup_input.Selected.INPUT_ID)
    )
);

ForAll(
    colInputSetup,
    Patch(
        colFieldTemplate,
        LookUp(
            colFieldTemplate,
            FIELD_SLOT = ThisRecord.FIELD_SLOT
        ),
        {
            ENABLE: true,
            FIELD_LABEL: ThisRecord.FIELD_LABEL
        }
    )
)

When doing this, the LAST SQL record (FIELD_ID = 3, TEST3) is set as FIELD_ID = 1 in my gallery. It always seems to grab the last record and put that in FIELD_ID = 1, regardless. Nothing else is updated. Why is only one template record (the first one) being updated (with the last SQL item) - but not the rest?

How can I, in the most efficient way possible, update an existing table() collection with some new values from a SQL query?

All I want to do is loop through some group ID's and retrieve their display names to append to a collection

But a basic GET request is, a it seems impossible to send.

So back to PowerAutomate and for a collection of 42 ID's it takes 5 mins via an apply to each since you cant send a batch. That's terrible. And thats with the concurrent setting on for the Apply to each.

Microsoft make it so hard sometimes. If this was a coded app it would be so easy to do in a standard fetch promse.

Has anyone ever got this working in PowerApps with the Office 365 Groups connector? Its so fast in Graph Explorer

Hi everyone,

I’m currently studying for my PL-900 certification exam and looking for some realistic career/learning advice from this community.

A bit of context about me: I don't come from a traditional IT background. I’m a Citizen Developer who spent the last few years automating tasks at my plant/factory using Excel and VBA. Right now, I’m focused on modernizing workflows, lifting old VBA code into the cloud, and building solutions with SharePoint, Power Apps, and Power Automate.

However, I operate under a few constraints:

• No admin rights (standard corporate environment restrictions).
• No internal Copilot integration within the Power Platform (we only have access to the free web version, nothing embedded in the studios).
• I only have access to Dataverse for Teams, when I build an App
• I feel like my practical experience is still somewhat limited/MVP-driven.

With Microsoft changing its certification paths recently and heavily pushing AI/Copilot everywhere, I’m feeling a bit lost. If my company doesn't leverage embedded AI features due to governance/licensing, does it even make sense to pursue the next certifications after PL-900?

My goal is to professionalize my skills. I want to learn clean architecture, proper data structures (handling the 5k SharePoint limit correctly, etc.), and systematic software design. I eventually want to bridge the gap toward a Senior Developer/Architect mindset over the next couple of years.

My questions for you guys:

1. Is it worth continuing the official Microsoft cert paths (like PL-100 or PL-200) if a lot of the new material focuses heavily on AI features I can't use at work?
2. What are the best alternative paths or resources to learn "clean code" and enterprise-ready architecture within the Power Platform boundaries (especially when stuck with SharePoint as a backend)?
3. For those who transitioned from VBA/Excel automation to advanced Cloud Developers, what was your breakthrough learning step?

Looking forward to your insights and advice! Thanks in advance!

PS. AI helped me to put my thoughts into English

Hi I have been working as a Power Platform Developer for 2 years. And I had an interview with a US based company as a Power apps Developer. I have answered all of the question correctly and honestly the interviewer was also impressed.

However I called HR today regarding the status of the application and feedback and she mentioned that the interviewer is yet to discuss with the Senior Management over the decision.

I am confused whether it’s a rejection or it’s something that usually happens in the big companies or this is how the hiring looks like. Can anyone help and me out share the experience and guide what to do. One thing I am sure whatever he has asked I have answered and I have strong grip on the power platform.

So, I made an app using vibe, and part of the functionality is that you store registrations in the app and it saves it to a sharepoint list. I was able to accomplish this by manually adding the list in the Data section, and then asking copilot to connect to it. This lets my app actually write into the list, and I can now use it for registrations and it shows up in my list. Yay.

But I can no longer add anything to the Data section. I had a second list I wanted to add, but whenever I try to add it manually it pops up for a few seconds, then disappears and I get an error message about how it can't save my changes. I just can't add any more lists, which is so strange because it literally worked like normal last week.

Hi all,

We are attempting to move our solution from Dev to prod. The issue we are encountering is that the approvals flow is saying that it cannot find the approvals connection, but the approvals connection is in the solution. I really hope it is because I am missing something simple. An ideas?

Thanks!

Hi all,

Looking for some general advice on a Power Pages/Dataverse pattern.

We have a portal where authorised internal support users sometimes need to view the portal as a specific contact for support and diagnostics. The aim is to check what that contact can actually see in the portal and help troubleshoot issues.

The current custom process starts outside the portal, from a model-driven app.

The simplified flow is:

1. Support user opens the model-driven app.
2. They search for and select the contact they need to view as.
3. They trigger a custom “View as” action.
4. A backend process updates Dataverse, including the relevant contact/external identity mapping.
5. The support user then has to switch from the model-driven app to the Power Pages portal.
6. They log into the portal and are treated as the selected contact.
7. When they need to move to another contact, they have to end/cancel the current session, return to the model-driven app, select the next contact, trigger “View as” again, then log out/log back into the portal.

This works in principle, but switching between contacts is the awkward part.

Because the change is made from the backend/Dataverse side, Power Pages does not always reflect it immediately. From Microsoft’s documentation, Dataverse changes can take up to around 15 minutes to appear in the portal because of server-side caching. So if the support user moves from Contact A to Contact B, the portal can still hold the previous context until the cache refreshes.

One idea is to move more of the process into Power Pages itself, so the “View as” change is triggered through the portal/Web API rather than only through a backend Dataverse update. In theory, this may update the portal-side cache more immediately.

The rough idea would be:

• support user logs into the portal as themselves;
• they have a restricted support/admin web role;
• they access a secure “View as contact” area;
• they search/select the contact;
• the action runs through the Power Pages Web API;
• the relevant contact / external identity mapping is updated;
• the support user logs out/in again and lands in the selected contact context.

The concern is that this could become quite fragile. There are questions around logout/login, whether web role changes take effect immediately, how to safely end/reverse the “View as” session, audit logging, stale context, and what happens if part of the process fails.

Has anyone dealt with a similar Power Pages caching issue or built a reliable “View as” / support-user pattern?

I’d be interested in any practical suggestions, patterns to avoid, or lessons learned around portal caching, external identities, web roles etc.

Thanks in advance!

Hi everyone,

I'm facing a strange bug where my published Power App behaves differently than it does in the edit mode (Power Apps Studio).

The Setup:

I have a canvas app that passes data from a SharePoint list to a Power Automate flow. The flow processes this data, generates a CSV file, and returns a download link back to the app.

The Problem:

In Edit Mode (Studio): Everything works flawlessly. The flow receives all fields from the list, and the generated CSV is complete.

In the Published Version: The app fails to send specific fields. As a result, the final CSV comes up with missing data.

What I've checked so far:

I confirmed this behavior by inspecting the Power Automate run logs. Looking closely at the trigger payload (the raw data package sent from the app to the flow), I can see that the fields are missing right at the start of the execution—but only when the request originates from the published version of the app.

Has anyone encountered this issue where the published version drops fields that the Studio version handles correctly? Any ideas on how to fix this?

Thanks in advance!

Hi all,

Does anyone know a good way to run python scripts through powerapps?

I’ve built a canvas app (standard license, no premium features) and it’s shared across a department of 70.

It’s a scheduling/planning tool for the department and the last feature id love to add is the ability to automate scheduling of tasks (~100 scientific assays a week)

The scheduling is a bit complex, we have to schedule to people who are available and trained in the methods and assign work closest to the sample available date and consider the due dates. It’s something which I’ve building a good python script to do - but I’m not sure how best a powerapp can run it.

Ideally the script could be run by any user when they need to, is this possible?
Or are there any alternatives?

I’ve been given a co-pilot license and trying to integrate co-pilot into the app for it “auto- schedule” but i don’t think co-pilot is any good and I’ve been able to get anywhere with it.

Thanks for any help! I actually posted on this community about 9 months asking if I’d be able to build a powerapp for scheduling/planning and now I’ve done it, it’s deployed to great feedback and other departments and sites are asking if I can make them one!