With model-driven apps offline for makers experience in general availability, it is now easier than before to set up an app to work offline. After enabling your model-driven apps for offline, people in your organization can work seamlessly without worrying about connectivity!

You can also choose the offline mode for your mobile apps. We are happy to announce the General Availability of the Offline-first mode that is optimized to improve the device performance and to work better in low-network conditions than “classic offline” mode.

Enable your app for offline from the app designer

In just a few clicks, you, the maker, can enable offline for your mobile users right in the maker portal. You can easily enable the app for offline to all users having access to the app (Default), or to a selected list of Users or Group of users (This option requires admin right).

Once enabled for offline, you will have to associate and offline profile to the app. The offline profile is the configuration of the data to download on the device. If you pick “New profile with current app data”, you will be able to quickly create a new offline profile precomputed by the system from the data configured in your app. You can also select an existing offline profile.

You can update the offline profile anytime, and add filters or any optimization as recommended in the guidelines.

Offline first

With the mobile “offline first” experience enabled for your model-driven apps, your users will see better device performance, a more responsive app, and lower battery usage as apps make fewer connections to the server.

With “Offline first”, data presented in your app is consistent regardless of the network connectivity. There is no toggle anymore for users to switch from offline to online mode, so users will not forget to sync their changes back to the server. The app will do it automatically. (learn more about the difference between “offline first” and “classic offline”)

We are looking forward to your feedback

Your feedback will help us continue to build on and improve the capabilities of this feature. Share your feedback in comments or on our Power Apps community forum post.

For more details, see the documentation.

The post Announcing General Availability for model-driven apps offline for maker appeared first on Microsoft Power Platform Blog.

With this preview, you can make Dataverse data available offline in your app with the flip of a switch. Just build your app with normal Power Fx formulas and the offline feature handles all the complexity for you.

Canvas offline apps are easy. Here’s why.

Creating an app with data available offline is easy. Just enable the app for offline in the General Settings in the Power Apps Studio and you’re on your way.

Once enabled, here is what happens in the background: an offline-enabled Power App first downloads on the device all of the data it needs from the server – to determine the data that need to be downloaded, the system uses an offline profile. An offline profile is a set of filters and restrictions on the data your app loads to users’ mobile devices. You can build complex offline apps using custom offline profiles that help you to optimize your app’s performance by reducing the amount of data downloaded to the device. But don’t worry! We introduced an auto-generated mode for simple apps that will work great for small to medium-sized data sets. You won’t have to think about it!

Once your data is downloaded, your offline enabled canvas app works in an offline first approach – the app reads and writes data to a local store on the device whether or not the network is available. It doesn’t have to be connected to work. Then, your changes and changes on the server are regularly synchronized for you automatically in the background when the network is available.

Limitations and Availability

• Dataverse Files and Images are not yet supported for this feature. We know how important it is for users and we are doing our best to enable it as soon as possible.
• Non-Dataverse connectors like Sharepoint are not supported in offline.

Power Apps developers can turn on the canvas offline feature in the Power Apps Studio by navigating to the settings dialog of the canvas app (Settings > General ) and toggling “Can be used offline”.

We are looking forward to your feedback

Your feedback will help us make this new app even better. Share your feedback on our Power Apps forum.

You can also reach us by filling out this form and we’ll get back to you right away. We are particularly interested to understand how you are using offline in your apps.

For more details, see the documentation.

The post Canvas built-in offline is now just one click away! appeared first on Microsoft Power Platform Blog.

Offline is critical in today’s world, but difficult.

Mobility is crucial in our modern world. It is natural to access your data anytime and anywhere. You don’t want to have to think about it! But, to create an offline app for canvas today is hard. Makers have to implement complex logic within the app, download data (many tables with a large variety of sizes) on the device, synchronize and merge the data when you make changes on your device, decide whether the app should work against the local content or the server, and track network availability – which can be challenging in spotty connectivity areas.

With this new canvas offline feature, the built-in offline engine does all of the hard work for you!

Canvas offline apps are easy. Here’s why.

Offline with Power Apps Canvas is easy. First, enable your tables for offline. Then, enable the App for offline and you’re on your way. Here is what happens in the background: an offline enabled Power App first downloads all of the data it needs from the server. A customizable offline profile defines what data is downloaded to the device. Once your data is downloaded, your offline enabled canvas app works in an offline first approach – the app reads and writes data to a local store on the device whether or not the network is available. It doesn’t have to be connected to work. Then, your changes and changes on the server are regularly synchronized for you automatically in the background when the network is available.

Limitations and Availability

• Dataverse Files and Images are not yet supported for this feature. We know how important it is for users and we are doing our best to enable it as soon as possible.
• Non-Dataverse connectors like Sharepoint are not supported in offline.

Power Apps developers can turn on the canvas offline feature in the Power Apps Studio by navigating to list of experimental features in settings dialog of the canvas app (Settings > Upcoming Features > Experimental) and toggling “Dataverse offline”.

The feature will roll out country by country from May 15th, 2023 to May 30th, 2023 in https://make.powerapps.com. It requires the latest version of the Power Apps mobile applications in the iOS, Android and Windows stores. Check out the prerequisites for more details.

We are looking forward to your feedback

Your feedback will help us make this new app even better. Share your feedback on our Power Apps forum.

You can also reach us by filling out this form and we’ll get back to you right away. We are particularly interested to understand how you are using offline in your apps.

For more details, see the documentation.

The post Announcing Experimental Preview of canvas built-in offline appeared first on Microsoft Power Platform Blog.

If you want a fast and modern way to get to your apps on Windows devices, this is your week!

We’re thrilled to announce the release of Power Apps (Preview) for Windows. You are just few clicks away from installing the brand new “Power Apps (preview)” application from the Microsoft Store. Try it out!

With the new Power Apps (preview) application, your will be able to run apps in offline within a brand new application fully integrated within the Windows OS and supporting the native Dataverse connector and native device capabilities like barcode scanner or Camera controls.

Find all of your canvas and model-driven apps in one place

Now, on Windows, you will find all your apps, model-driven and canvas apps, in the Apps view of the Power Apps (preview) application. Just pick one and you will be ready to go! You can always jump into the App list clicking on the back button of the application.

Make offline-capable apps

Offline on Windows works just like it does on iOS and Android!

If you use a model-driven app, you can configure the app to work in offline creating an offline profile, and if you use a canvas app, you can use the LoadData/SaveData functions in you app.

You’ll find below a very simple example of an implementation of a canvas app supporting offline and using the Native Dataverse Connector:

Users are then able to seamlessly use the app in remote locations, farmlands, warehouse or basement just to name few examples:

Use device capabilities in your apps

With the Camera and the Microphone of your device, you can enable key scenarios: front line users can take pictures to report back on an observation in the field, they can also use a bar code scanner to automatically register a critical information from a document or a phone app, they can also record the outcome of a meeting with a customer.

The new Power Apps (preview) app provides native experiences of the device capabilities. Try them out using media controls (audio and video, barcode scanner, file attachements, …)  in your apps!

Manage Power Apps (preview) with Intune

The new Power Apps (preview) application is a Universal Windows App and is natively supporting Intune for application management. It gives you control over who or which device can install the application, and you can also control the app auto-update if needed.

Install Power Apps (preview)

The Power Apps (preview) application is available in the Microsoft Store store and to install the app, it is just as easy as installing any other Windows app. However, you can check always out the documentation.

What’s coming next

This is just a beginning! We have much more to add to this application. Just to name a few:

• Push Notifications
• Guest access
• Recent and Favorite apps
• Pin to start

We are looking forward to your feedback

Your feedback will help us make this new app even better. Share your feedback in comments or on our Power Apps forum post.

You can also reach me by filling out this form and I’ll get back to you right away.

For more details, see the documentation.

The post Announcing Public Preview of a new Power Apps application on Windows appeared first on Microsoft Power Platform Blog.