6 min read
What Is a Model-Driven App?
In our blog series 'Discover the building blocks of Power Apps', we cover all the parts of Power Apps one by one. In the previous blog in the series, we talked about Canvas Apps. In this blog, we take a closer look at Model-Driven Apps. Discover what a Model-Driven App is in Power Apps, what you can do with it, and how it works together with other parts of the Power Platform.
What is a Model-Driven App in Microsoft Power Apps?
Model-Driven Apps are part of Microsoft Power Apps. It's a type of application within Power Apps.
Model-Driven Apps were first introduced by Microsoft in 2018. With Model-Driven Apps, everything revolves around the data model and the underlying structure of the data. A Model-Driven App can only use Dataverse as its data source.
A Model-Driven App consists of, among other things, a sitemap, views, and forms. These are standard components that are always available:
- Sitemap: The sitemap forms the navigation structure of the application. This determines which selections and tables are accessible to users.
- Views: These are predefined views that present data in list or table form. Users can quickly browse through items, and views can be customized to show specific columns or filters.
- Forms: Forms are used to view the details of a specific item and edit them.
Forms and views are automatically generated for each table in Dataverse. This is a default layout. New forms and views can be created in the Dataverse table that are fully tailored to the user's expectations. Want to know more about Dataverse? Then check out the blog: what is Dataverse?
The Model-Driven App Designer makes it easy to build apps with components such as dashboards and forms.
What can you do with a Model-Driven App?
With a Model-Driven App, it's possible to digitize and automate complex processes. Where Canvas Apps offer flexibility in design, Model-Driven Apps take a more data-driven approach. Here, the focus is on structuring and managing data. To illustrate this further, I've listed a few Model-Driven Apps use cases:
- Customer management (CRM): For companies that want to manage their customer interactions in a single system, a Model-Driven App can offer a solution. The app can help track customer data, sales opportunities, and service requests. This makes it possible to bring together customer interactions and documentation such as quotes and sales contracts in a single app.
- Customer service: In many organizations, customer interactions such as questions, complaints, and requests are often managed through various channels like email, phone, or separate documents. This can lead to confusion and delays in the response process. A Model-Driven App can offer a solution. All customer interactions can then be logged in a single system. This makes it possible to quickly assign customer questions to the right employees, track progress, send automatic reminders, and set up updates.
- Inventory management: For companies that want to manage their inventory from purchasing to sales, a Model-Driven App can help track stock levels, orders, and deliveries. For example, we built a Journal Catalogue for SURF. In this Model-Driven App, all data around publication negotiations is stored and processed. Read more about this case here.
- Compliance and risk management: For many organizations that need to comply with government regulations and risk requirements, reporting on and adhering to these guidelines can be a time-consuming and difficult task. Audits carried out manually often need to be processed separately and then merged into a single overview. A Model-Driven App can offer a solution here. This lets you centralize all audits and compliance data in a single system. By creating different forms, all types of audits can easily be carried out and stored in the app. The stored data from the app can easily be exported whenever needed.
With Model-Driven Apps, data is entered in a standardized way, supported by smart underlying logic.
Role within Power Apps
Model-Driven Apps are suited to complex applications and challenges. They provide a standardized user experience by automatically generating the interface based on the data model. Model-Driven Apps also offer built-in support for workflows and business rules. With workflows, tasks can be automated from within the app, and with business rules, forms can be dynamically adjusted based on specific conditions.
Where Canvas Apps focus on one specific task and Power Pages focuses on external users, Model-Driven Apps are meant to automate and improve entire business processes.
How do Model-Driven Apps work together with the Power Platform?
Model-Driven Apps work seamlessly with the other parts of the Power Platform. By integrating the various parts of the Power Platform with each other, valuable solutions can be built. Below, I've listed a few examples (per part of the Power Platform):
- Dataverse: Model-Driven Apps always use Dataverse as their data store. As a result, these work together excellently. All data, forms, and views are stored centrally in this Dataverse table (or tables).
- Power Automate: With Power Automate, processes within a Model-Driven App can be automated. These can be Power Automate flows that make changes based on a certain status, or flows that run after a button is clicked.
- Power BI: Power BI can be integrated into Model-Driven Apps to display dashboards and reports. It's possible to add a Power BI report or dashboard to a Model-Driven App.
- Power Pages: A Model-Driven App can be part of a Power Pages site by connecting to the site's Dataverse tables. Requests or applications submitted via the Power Pages site can be viewed and reviewed in a Model-Driven App. This enables seamless processing of external requests.
Limitations of Model-Driven Apps
Besides all the advantages and possibilities Model-Driven Apps offer, there are also a number of limitations. Model-Driven Apps always require a Dataverse database. This means users need to have a Power Apps Premium license. In addition, there's limited customization possible for the UI (User Interface) and UX (User Experience). This makes the applications less intuitive and user-friendly in some cases.
Conclusion
Model-Driven Apps stand out because they're strongly data-driven and focus on managing complex business processes. They're ideal for organizations working with large volumes of data and many different tables, thanks to the connection with Dataverse. Model-Driven Apps are the perfect choice for organizations that want to automate and work more efficiently. Model-Driven Apps are robust and scalable and offer the ability to leverage integrations with other Power Platform tools such as Power Automate, Power BI, and Power Pages for further automation and reporting.
Written by Mathijs van der Ven
Low-Code Consultant