Power Apps Everywhere

Throughout this book, we have seen how useful applications developed with Power Apps can be. Whether using multiple data sources or improving the application building process through components, Power Apps allows makers to create solutions quickly and reliably for organizations.

Keep in mind that applications created with this platform are not just accessible through the Power Apps portal. There are many ways to use them through embedding, desktop applications, mobile devices, and more.

In this chapter, we will discover all the possible ways to interact with Power Apps through different mediums, with the help of the following recipes:

• Discovering applications through the Pin to Home feature on mobile devices
• Leveraging modern browsers for Power Apps
• Improving SharePoint document libraries with Power Apps
• Embedding Power Apps in SharePoint pages
• Making Power BI reports interactive with embedded Power Apps
• Working...

Technical requirements

The licensing model for this platform depends on the type of connector needed for your data sources. Standard connectors like the one used for SharePoint don’t require an additional license besides Microsoft 365, but premium or custom connectors do require a Power Apps license.

For more information about the Power Apps licensing model, please refer to the Preface section. The GitHub repository located at https://github.com/PacktPublishing/Microsoft-Power-Apps-Cookbook-Second-Edition/tree/main/Chapter07 holds the required files depending on the recipe.

Discovering applications through the Pin to Home feature on mobile devices

This recipe will introduce how to interact with applications created in Power Apps besides using the maker portal at https://make.powerapps.com

On mobile devices, the Power Apps application acts as a hub for all your solutions and is available on the most popular application stores:

• Google Play https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.microsoft.msapps
• Apple’s App Store https://apps.apple.com/us/app/power-apps/id1047318566

Once logged in, this hub will list all the applications the user can access and is available on both phones and tablet devices.

These versions share a feature called Pin to Home, which creates an individual icon on the device’s home screen to open a specific application. In this recipe, we will learn how to implement this feature to help with application adoption and discovery.

How to do it…

1. Install the Power Apps...

Leveraging modern browsers for Power Apps

Web browsers are the gateway for almost every online activity we do. They are not just for browsing websites anymore; they also serve apps, services, communication, and gaming. All without the need for app installation.

That’s why using a modern browser should be a common-sense rule for everyone; they use the latest web technologies and, most importantly, are up to date with security fixes.

In this recipe, we will leverage one of the latest features introduced in modern browsers to get faster access to the apps we create. This feature will help us improve application discovery on desktop devices, as mentioned in the previous Discovering applications through the Pin to Home feature on mobile devices recipe.

Getting ready

This workaround will require a Chromium-based browser such as Microsoft Edge, Brave, or Google Chrome. For more information regarding which browsers use this technology, please refer to https://en.wikipedia...

Improving SharePoint document libraries with Power Apps

In Chapter 1, Building Pixel-Perfect Solutions with Canvas Apps, we discovered the ability to embed Power Apps in SharePoint lists. This feature opens a wide range of possibilities to handle this data compared to SharePoint’s standard forms by allowing you to use a full-featured canvas application.

We can also improve SharePoint document libraries. Since they inherit the functionality of SharePoint lists, the same Power Apps integration applies. However, since the focus is on handling files instead of items, this integration lacks usability from a user perspective.

This recipe will explain how to improve this integration by using a SharePoint feature called column formatting. We can change how columns get displayed using styling code. For more information, refer to https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/dev/declarative-customization/column-formatting

Getting ready

Since we are using SharePoint as our...

Embedding Power Apps in SharePoint pages

SharePoint pages are the tool of choice when using this platform for content management. Using content blocks, called web parts, you can build pages with text, images, videos, and dynamic content.

One of SharePoint’s content blocks is the Power Apps web part, which allows embedding a canvas app inside a page for easier access. For more information on web parts, please refer to https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/using-web-parts-on-sharepoint-pages-336e8e92-3e2d-4298-ae01-d404bbe751e0

Getting ready

We will need an existing application to use the Power Apps web part. The same rules for executing applications apply here:

• It needs to be shared with users to be able to run the application.
• If a license is required to use the app, it will be enforced on the users accessing the SharePoint page.
• The users must grant the use of any connectors inside the app.

We will use the same application designed...

Making Power BI reports interactive with embedded Power Apps

Power BI is the reporting tool par excellence. It allows the fusion of many data sources to build dashboards and reports that aid organizations in getting the knowledge they need from the insight received from this data.

Being part of the Power Platform, we can expect integrations from other tools that compose this platform. For example, Power BI integrates with Power Automate via alerts. When an alert gets triggered, a cloud flow can execute notifications depending on the trigger’s data or maybe record these alerts in a data source for auditing purposes.

In the case of Power Apps, it allows embedding applications inside reports to extend the data visualization or the information processing, thus improving the interaction with the analytics solution.

Getting ready

This recipe will use Power BI Desktop, the free tool intended for designing reports. Installing it from the Microsoft Store is recommended...

Working with Power Apps in Microsoft Teams channels

Microsoft Teams is the central hub of an organization’s content. The numerous capabilities available on this platform range from communication and collaboration to content access and more.

One of its most valuable aspects is the opportunity to extend its features through customizations. For example, you can build custom applications, enhance messaging capabilities, build bots, and embed web content. Power Apps allows the creation of applications integrated within this collaborative platform.

Getting ready

This recipe will build an app for Microsoft Teams to handle the channels in a given team. To make this work, the user must have access to a team with proper permission to add and remove apps.

The canvas app will take advantage of the Microsoft Teams integrations using the context parameters available when using an embedded app. For more information, please visit: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powerapps...

Automating the integration of Power Apps inside Teams

When a custom application gets deployed to the Apps section in Microsoft Teams, it becomes available to the whole platform. You can use them in channels, chats, and even as a standalone application inside the Teams interface by pinning them to the main toolbar.

These methods allow you to configure Teams to match your needs. However, you might need to build an application for your entire organization that is quickly available for all users on the main toolbar without asking them to pin it manually.

We can achieve this using the Microsoft Teams admin portal. We will also learn how to automate the deployment of a Team with an app.

Getting ready

To manage the Microsoft Teams admin portal, the user requires the Teams service admin role. An administrator can grant you this role through the Microsoft 365 admin center, https://admin.microsoft.com/, or the Azure portal, https://portal.azure.com/

There is a license requirement...

Building apps with Dataverse for Teams

Throughout this chapter, there have been many interactions with Microsoft Teams, from embedding tabs to integrating directly to the Teams interface.

Microsoft also offers a way to build apps for this platform by introducing Dataverse for Teams. This approach allows creating applications inside a team with the ability to use them through desktop and mobile devices. This team acts as a unique environment, just like the regular environments we have seen throughout the book.

Dataverse for Teams builds upon the idea of having several components that work together inside a Team environment, including a built-in light version of Dataverse, Power Automate cloud flows, canvas apps, Virtual Agents chatbots, and more. You’ll find more information regarding this topic here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powerapps/teams/overview-data-platform

This recipe will create an application using this new approach for building apps for Microsoft...