Self-paced Workshop I wonder how many of us use shared mailboxes to funnel work? How well does a shared mailbox, on its own, work. Do all team members do their fair share of the work answering messages from the shared mailbox or does social loafing run rampant? Maybe it is time to consider moRead More…
When I made my first app with Microsoft Power Apps, I was so excited and impressed by the relative ease to quickly create a useful and functioning app. It was great getting an app in the hands of co-workers and other users, fast. As I create more and more apps, I have learned that it is not alwaRead More…
In a previous post Embed a Power App on a SharePoint page, I shared how I like to deploy apps by embedding the apps in SharePoint. I find it to be one of the easiest ways to distribute an app to a wide audience for access on primary devices with very little need for end-user training. A few commentRead More…
I love Excel and sometimes I wish I could use all of the same Excel functions in Power Apps but I can’t so I nest (enclose one function within another function) a lot of functions instead. In my example Technology Loaner Request app, users are able to request laptops and phones. There are severaRead More…
One of the greatest things about Power Apps is that app development is more accessible to process owners and process workers. Whoever may be closest to a problem or inefficiency has an opportunity to make something better. There is a learning curve and sometimes documentation is not available and sRead More…
It is worth taking the time to add some functional features to SharePoint pages. SharePoint is already a wealth of information and an obvious search starting point but by embedding Power Apps onto SharePoint pages, SharePoint becomes the starting point for workflow as well. There is less need to knRead More…
Power BI is becoming an indispensable enterprise tool for re-imagining business processes, monitoring work flow and reporting. Adding automatic notifications makes this good thing even better. Power BI Here’s what you’ll need: Access to Power BI service (free license works)Access to an alrRead More…
Power Apps is equipped with a lot of great functions. Unfortunately, Not In is not an available function but there are ways to get the same result. In the example below, there are a list of users in a gallery. The list is displayed by the following code entered in the Items box for the gallery:ORead More…
I like single page apps. One with a little gallery and a little form, a button, a title and voila, it’s good to go. Unfortunately, Microsoft has added some not so useful text in the form. You’ve probably been exasperated by it before. The dreaded No Item to Display -or worse- Getting Your Data seemRead More…
Teams can literally be a one-stop shop for work in a modern business. Adding Power BI and Power Apps tabs make it even more powerful and convenient. Add a Power BI Reports tab in Teams In Microsoft Teams, click the desired team.Click the + on the header bar.On the Add a tab window, click PoweRead More…
I really enjoy working with PowerApps but I cannot say the same about the default form controls. I suppose my SharePoint list datasource is to blame but I prefer to keep the SharePoint columns as simple as possible. Unless my SharePoint list columns contain dates, people’s names, numbers or many liRead More…
In the last post, Handling Errors in PowerApps, I discussed a way to prevent errors by disabling submit buttons until all required fields are completed and how to display custom error text for a data card based upon another data card’s value. That post spawned some questions which are the focus Read More…
I like to make each PowerApps app look like an app. A colleague of mine noticed this about apps I develop and told me that’s what I did. It had not really dawned on me. It is not enough for me to simply make the app function, I must design the app. I must think about how the user will interact withRead More…
One of the easiest ways to deal with errors in a PowerApps form is to prevent them and stopping end-users from submitting incomplete forms is the quickest way to getting good data. Required Fields Disable Form Submit Buttons in One Step The Error property of PowerApps forms contain a builtRead More…
Unpivot Columns In Power BI, Unpivot Columns transforms columns into rows with attributes and values. In other words, it changes the data structure and as a result it can change values in a visualization. Other ColumnsApplesOrangesBananas12344212 In the table above, we can sum thRead More…
I am not the biggest fan of Success screens but I have started adding them to a few apps I developed. Why? In the right app, a Success screen can add value. For example, if I am developing an app where the end user will not receive any other confirmation of their interaction with the app? If so,Read More…
A while ago, I was asked about the possibility to automate creating documents. Recently, a friend asked the same question. Her organization is hoping to develop a homegrown solution instead of purchasing a tool that fails to do everything they need it to do. I’d worked out a pretty quick solution aRead More…
As I develop apps, I am constantly looking for ways to enhance the data that’s there. I enjoy using images as a way to draw attention to specific records and provide more detail, at-a-glance, In this sample app, I use a simple image (the red exclamation mark) to signify a high priority incidenRead More…
I prefer to remove the standard refresh buttons from my PowerApps screens. Instead, I build automatic refresh into action states like OnVisible for screens. When a screen becomes visible, data is refreshed and my app’s users see the latest data. Here are my two favorite methods for automaticallyRead More…
Give your PowerApps app a bespoke feel with a customized Welcome Screen. Don’t let this concept fool you. The Welcome Screen can do a lot more than say “hello”! Consider adding in some information about the current user for more thoughtful functionality.
Add a New Screen On the Home tab, clRead More…
If you have recently generated a PowerApps app from data, you probably ended up with a 3 screen app. The first page of that app probably has a gallery. Basic default gallery By default, anyone using the app sees all records. This gallery can be customized to only show the records of the user Read More…
Use functions in a gallery In a previous post, a gallery was customized by adding a new label. The label displays the data from a field in the data source. Emphasis was added to the label by changing some of the label’s color properties. Unfortunately, there isn’t always data in the field forRead More…
Importing data into Power BI from a data source, like SharePoint, can result in some odd behavior. Date and time values often appear in UTC time instead of the local time zone. Easily convert the time zone with a custom column: Make sure Date/Time/Zone is the data type for your current colRead More…
It isn’t made to. Microsoft Excel isn’t expected to open Microsoft Word files. Don’t expect OneNote to open anything but OneNote files. Although, OneNote Online is not designed to open other application files like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, audio and video files it is very common to see various fiRead More…
Give your PowerApps app a sleek and polished look by changing the background colors. Basic app with minimal customizations In the example below, the background colors have been changed to black giving the app a ‘dark mode’ feel. Basic app with black background The key to this look is thRead More…
Get More Bang for the Gallery PowerApps has the ability to place app development in the hands of workers that are closest to the problems at hand. This is an exciting opportunity for any organization. Unfortunately, this opportunity does have a few limitations. Citizen apps tend to lack functRead More…