A Mountain of Shitty Little Apps

When Microsoft introduced the Power Platform as a "Citizen-Friendly" set of tools for non-technical business users to create apps to solve business challenges, it seemed a worthy endeavor. Well, enough time has passed to assess the outcome. Those who jumped in with both feet now have a mountain of shitty little apps. Those who watched from the sidelines decided, "We don't need that!" So is that the end of the tale? Let's see.

The First Mistake

To enable broad and rapid adoption of the Power Platform, Microsoft decided to add a "seeded" Power Apps capability to all Microsoft 365 licenses. Thus instantly putting a version of this technology into millions of "citizens" hands. While IT could turn this "off", it was "on" by default. Microsoft knew that no IT Admin would ever enable it if it were the other way around. This led to many citizens seizing the opportunity to replace their shitty little Excel spreadsheets with a slightly less shitty app. Excel was the original Citizen tool, and many organizations have a ton of Excel spreadsheets floating around, which are now slowly but surely being replaced with shitty Power Apps built by people who not only don't know what they are doing but don't know that there is anything beyond those seeded capabilities.

The Second Mistake

Once IT figured out what was happening, many flipped the switch stopping this unchecked motion. In response to alleviate their concerns, Microsoft launched the "Center of Excellence" CoE. A tool that could wrangle this proliferation of shitty apps to be under IT's control again. CoE was a solution to a Microsoft-created problem. Now IT could see all of the shitty apps that had been built, including apps that never got used, multiple apps trying to solve the same problems, apps connecting to external sources, apps exposing internal confidential sources, and users having access to apps they shouldn't. There are few things more fun than watching the faces of fear of IT when a CoE lights up.

Going back to the Fork

I have written before about the poor citizen, oblivious to anything beyond the seeded capabilities, building some contorted solution only to months later learn there were better options. They unknowingly took a fork, unaware there was more than one fork to take. Their anger towards Microsoft is deserved. But they are not the only ones to take the wrong fork; Microsoft also did. Microsoft determined at the beginning that Joe NoNothing building his own app to solve his own problem was the best path. With rare exceptions, disaster ensued, or a least a lot of wasted time. Recognizing the obvious, that no organization wants a thousand shitty little apps, Microsoft took a pivot with an emphasis on a new idea, "Fusion Teams". Pair Joe NoNothing with Sally KnowsAlot and Bob ProDev... this is a "Fusion Team". Now instead of a shitty little app that does not do very much, you can expect a nice little app that does not do very much. Again, even the Fusion Team has taken the wrong fork.

What Other Fork is There?

There is another fork, but you can't see it from the seeded Power Apps. Had Microsoft called the seeded Power Apps something like Power Apps Lite, you might have been given a clue, but inexplicably, they chose not to. So you are left thinking that you have seen Power Apps and are justifiably unimpressed. But there is another "Power Apps" in the Power Platform. One that is much more capable and runs on top of a relational database called Dataverse instead of a SharePoint list or Excel spreadsheet. Why did you not know about this? Why would you? In the time you have been struggling to create a Canvas app, you could have built an entire, bulletproof solution to your problem. A solution that could be easily extended also to solve related problems.

What's the Catch?

Ok, you got me; the catch is that the "real" Power Platform is not included with your Microsoft 365 license. It will add either $5 or $20 to your monthl