Today the Power Platform introduces its formula language for low-code, Microsoft Power Fx. This language originates from Microsoft Excel and is already the foundation of the Microsoft Power Apps canvas. You may wonder, why does a low-code platform need a programming language? The truth is, point-and-click tools are great for quickly assembling experiences and workflows, but many apps need a layer of logic that goes beyond what is practical to drag and drop, for example:
- Show a list of customers who signed up in the last 7 days within 15 miles of this location.
- Highlight the newest entries in green.
- When a user clicks for more details, if the record has outstanding action items associated with it, pop those to the top of the screen.
Custom logic traditionally needed to solve such problems is where low-code platforms have “hit a cliff” requiring traditional code, where the Low-code application development on Azure solution has stepped in. Power Fx enables 200+ million people globally who build with Microsoft Excel syntax to build custom logic, reducing much of the “cliff”. However, this does not reduce the integration capabilities of Azure and Power Apps but enhances them.
Developers will cut their development time and cost by using Power Fx where the complexities of async coding are taken care of, Dataverse, Power Apps’ underlying data platform, entities and data types are first class objects, and guard rails prevent run away code and other common pitfalls. Additionally, developers can use Power Fx with tools they are already familiar with such as VS (Visual Studio) Code, GitHub, Azure DevOps, and their own build scripts and tools. Power Fx works with “pro-code” components created in JavaScript, C#, or other professional languages. Read the entire Power Fx announcement here.