From the Microsoft Power Platform blogs: Test Studio; Store, load JSON; AI Builder; Host object

In this week’s Power Platform blog roundup:

• Making sense of Power Apps Test Studio
• How to store and load JSON in PowerApps
• Introduction of AI Builder in Power Automate: how businesses can leverage AI features in their process automation
• How to know browser and OS details in Power Apps using host object

 Making sense of Power Apps Test Studio

Writing on his blog, Temmy Raharjo stated that the Power Apps Test Studio enables you to build end-to-end UI tests for your canvas app. He pointed out that Test Studio lets you maintain the quality of your app by continually validating that your app works as expected when you deploy new changes or updates.

Raharjo wrote that based on the documentation definition of Test Studio, it gives you the ability create integration tests using the low-code programming language, like Power Fx. He noted that this can help you boost the quality of your app via a comprehensive integration test.

In his blog post, Raharjo offered an example, complete with screenshots, of how to build a UI test for your app.

How to store and load JSON in PowerApps

On the Let's Power Automate blog, Tom Riha wrote that when you build a SharePoint-based solution, there are two basic ways users can interact with it. You can let them use SharePoint with all its functionality: search, display forms, sorting, views, etc., or you can build a Power App.

Riha stated that the Power App will include all the necessary functionality and completely hide the SharePoint lists on the background.

And since the list is on the background, you can be much more creative with the data structure. Instead of having a separate column for everything, you can group the information – especially helpful if you work with dynamic number of values.

Riha noted that since his blog post is mostly about Power Automate, it will show you how to store and read JSON data from a SharePoint list, or any other source.

First, Riha explained the settings you should use for the SharePoint column. Next, he wrote about how to store a JSON into this column and how to read the JSON.

Finally, Riha noted that while PowerApps can give more freedom over the data on the background so you can use even more complex data objects, you shouldn't use it for all your solutions. He pointed out that it's just an alternative solution for when the database gets too complicated or when you’re working with a dynamic number of inputs.

Introduction of AI Builder in Power Automate: how businesses can leverage AI features in their process automation