Hi all! The Microsoft Build 2022 Book of Reviews continues... The next Build story is about a virtual attendee, I had the pleasure to talk to my friend Olena Grischenko after the event. Olena is a Power Platform and Dynamics 365 Solution Architect, with 17+ years of experience from building business applications with Microsoft technologies. Originally from Ukraine, she is now living in Sidney, Australia, where she has been for the past 13 years. She is a BizApps MVP, Woman In Tech supporter and self-employed at Technomancy Pty Ltd since January 2020.
As a former Power Apps portals (now Power Pages) specialist, surprisingly not, the most exciting announcement for Olena was the introduction of Power Pages. The new learning hub gathers documents, videos, and other Power Pages related resources.
Olena about Microsoft Build
Olena has a technical background, she is a developer and Build has always meant lots of exciting news for her. In fact, Build is THE Microsoft event of the year for Olena and she has been wanting to experience it in-person for many years. She even had plans on buying a registration ticket for in-person Build 2020, however that became the year when the event turned virtual.
“In general I love the Build conference because it’s dev things!”
Build being Olena’s favorite conference, she also has a special relation to it in the context of Power Platform. She remembers a few years back how they talked about Power Apps, which means low code and to a professional developer that might trigger some thoughts around your own existence and right place to be over the years to come. She remembered worrying about if there will be no more coding opportunities available and she also remembers getting thoughts like being too old to learn something new. Luckily, it turned out, Power Platform is for developers too!
As already mentioned, Olena is from Ukraine and still has family and friends there. Miraculously her mom and granny managed to come to Australia to live with her for now and so did her brother. With everything that has happened over the last couple of months, as the Build 2022 dates came closer, the event was not in the center of attention in Olena’s life to say the least. Hearing about Power Pages though made her switch focus, if only for a while, and the feeling of excitement really shows when talking to her as well as in the article she wrote shortly after the event.
Due to time zones and sessions being held in the middle of the night for Olena, this year she watched sessions on-demand as soon as they became available. As already mentioned, Power Pages was what caught her interest the most. Olena has been working with Power Apps portals since the early Adxstudio portals beta days. Read more about Adxstudio portals becoming Power Apps portals. What she really likes with Power Pages is basically pretty and easy. Olena about why Power Pages where the most exciting news:
“Of course, as a person who is interested in making portals prettier in an easier way”
If Olena could have wished for something more, it would be sort of taking the Express Design capability and apply it to Power Pages, so that one could do a drawing in Adobe XD and generate Power Pages from it. Adobe XD to Power Apps app would not be a bad thing either, because customers use Adobe XD. Another thing would be to have CCS designer capabilities from within the Power Pages designer. Oh well, perhaps we will get that in the future.
The possibility to enable Content Delivery Network (CDN) with your Power Pages site is another thing that Olena finds exciting, simply because it is about improving performance. You can read more about CDN in this post
What’s next?
Besides from supporting her Ukrainian family and friends who are still in Ukraine or spread around the world and besides immediately trying out Power Pages and getting involved in related activities, she also plans for new Women In Tech meetups in the Asia Pacific area.
Thank you Olena for taking time telling me about your Build experience! You can connect with this amazing power woman on Twitter and LinkedIn.
The next Build story will be published soon.
Stay tuned!
