App checker is a powerful tool that inspects an app’s formulas and highlights any potential issues, such as performance-related issues, accessibility barriers, and delegation warnings.
Use Cases for App checker
Below are some use cases for the App checker:
- Identify and rectify formula errors: The App checker scans through all formulas within your app, finding errors that can disrupt app performance.
- Enhancing app performance: By identifying areas in your applications where data isn’t being delegated properly, App checker allows you to improve the overall performance of your apps.
- Improving accessibility: App checker identifies accessibility factors like color contrast, keyboard navigation etc., ensuring that your applications are usable for people with various disabilities.
Understanding Solution Checker
While App checker is focused on individual apps, Solution checker goes one step further and looks at entire solutions within your Power Platform environment.
It identifies and reports concerning patterns or practices that could affect your solution’s performance, maintainability, reliability, and more, offering detailed reports which can guide optimization efforts.
Use Cases for Solution checker
Consider the following use cases for Solution checker:
- Optimizing solutions: By offering detailed insights about the performance, maintainability, and reliability of your solutions, Solution checker sets you on the right path for optimization, ensuring top-notch, glitch-free solutions.
- Uncovering difficult-to-spot issues: Solution checker helps expose issues like plugin performance, security factors, JavaScript codes, HTML usage, and more.
- Providing detailed reports: After performing the check, Solution checker provides a downloadable detailed report containing the issues, severity level, recommended fixes along with official documentation links for further reference.
App Checker vs Solution Checker: A Comparative Insight
While both App checker and Solution checker serve the same fundamental purpose, the scope and intensity change slightly. The table below gives a comparison of the two:
App Checker | Solution Checker | |
Scope | Checks a single app | Checks entire solutions |
Output | Identifies app errors, delegation warnings, and accessibility barriers | Gives a comprehensive report of issues affecting solution’s reliability, maintainability, and performance |
Use Case | Used when developing or updating a PowerApps application | Used when developing or updating solutions that span across PowerApps, Flows, and more |
Each of these tools comes in handy at different stages of your Power Platform journey. Whether it’s the application-level precision of the App checker or the wider, solution-centric scope of Solution checker, these are valuable assets to streamline your apps and solutions. For a prospective Microsoft Power Platform Functional Consultant, harnessing the power of these checking tools can pave the way for functional and efficient Power Platform solutions.
Practice Test
1) True or False: The App checker in the Power Platform is a tool that helps identify errors, warnings, and performance tips in your canvas apps.
- True
- False
Answer: True
Explanation: App checker is a tool that is used in Power Platform to catch issues that might affect app performance, scalability, and maintainability.
2) True or False: The Solution checker is limited to checking only managed solutions.
- True
- False
Answer: False
Explanation: Solution checker can check both managed and unmanaged solutions. It helps identify issues affecting performance or causing errors.
3) Single select: Which platform provides the App checker tool?
- a) Apple iOS
- b) Microsoft Power Platform
- c) Google Android platform
- d) Amazon Web Services platform
Answer: b) Microsoft Power Platform
Explanation: The App checker tool is a feature of the Microsoft Power Platform and is used to identify potential issues in canvas apps.
4) Multiple select: Which of the following are common use cases for the App checker tool?
- a) Identifying unused variables in a canvas app
- b) Debugging runtime errors in a canvas app
- c) Identifying performance-limiting issues in a canvas app
- d) Predicting user behavior within a canvas app
Answer: a) Identifying unused variables in a canvas app, b) Debugging runtime errors in a canvas app, c) Identifying performance-limiting issues in a canvas app
Explanation: App checker tool is used to identify and fix issues like unused variables, runtime errors, and performance-related problems. It’s not used to predict user behavior.
5) True or False: The Solution checker provides guidance and best practices to fix identified issues.
- True
- False
Answer: True
Explanation: The Solution checker not only identifies issues but also gives recommendations based on Microsoft’s best practices to fix these issues.
6) Single select: In which Microsoft Power Platform environment can the Solution checker tool be used?
- a) Personal environment
- b) Default environment
- c) Trial environment
- d) All of the above
Answer: d) All of the above
Explanation: The Solution checker tool can be used in any Microsoft Power Platform environment (Personal, Default, or Trial) to check for issues in solutions.
7) Multiple select: The App checker tool can identify which of the following problems?
- a) Formatting errors in app layout
- b) Deprecated elements usage
- c) Misuse of controls
- d) All of the above
Answer: d) All of the above
Explanation: The App checker is designed to identify and correct issues that might affect app performance or result in errors, including formatting errors, deprecated elements usage, and misuse of controls.
8) Single select: Which tool in the Power Platform assists in identifying problems with your model-driven apps?
- a) App checker
- b) Solution checker
- c) PowerApps checker
- d) None of the above
Answer: b) Solution checker
Explanation: Solution Checker analyzes your solutions to help identify and fix platform issues pertaining to configuration, implementation, and performance.
9) True or False: Solution checker can only be run by Power Platform administrators.
- True
- False
Answer: False
Explanation: Any Power Platform user with read access to the environments can run the Solution checker.
10) Single Select: Solution Checker performs which types of tests?
- a) Performance tests
- b) Maintainability tests
- c) Service limitations tests
- d) All of the above
Answer: d) All of the above
Explanation: Solution Checker performs performance, maintainability, and service limitations tests to analyze Power Platform solutions for improved reliability and performance.
Interview Questions
What is the functionality of the App checker in Power Platform?
The App checker is a feature in Power Platform that analyzes an app’s formulas and the use of its components and provides guidance for improving the performance, maintainability, and accessibility of the app.
How can the Solution checker be beneficial in the Power Platform?
The Solution checker identifies potential performance issues, problematic patterns, or incorrect configurations that can affect an app’s performance. It allows developers better understand and improve the overall health and performance of their apps and flows.
How is the App checker different from the Solution Checker?
The App Checker is focused on checking the formulas and the usage of components within the app. Solution Checker, on the other hand, checks the entire solution, including plugins, workflows, and business rules.
What type of information does the Solution checker report provide?
The Solution checker report will specify the issues by severity and category, list out the relevant components affected, and offer some guidance to resolve the issue.
Can the results from the App checker and Solution checker be exported?
Yes, the results from both the App checker and the Solution checker can be downloaded for offline view or for sharing with the team.
How frequently can you run the Solution checker?
You can run the Solution checker as many times as you want. It’s recommended to use it regularly during the solution development and before releasing the production.
Are the App checker and Solution checker automatically integrated into the Power Platform?
Yes, both App checker and Solution checker are built-in features of the Power Platform and can be accessed from the Power Apps maker portal.
How does the App checker contribute to the app development process?
The App checker contributes to the app development process by identifying issues, providing detailed error messages with descriptions of what’s wrong, where it’s wrong, and offers suggestions on how to fix these issues.
What benefits does the Solution checker provide to developers?
It gives developers guidance to follow best practices, improve performance and stability, and resolve potential issues before they become problems in production.
Can the Solution checker be used on on-premise deployments?
No, the Solution checker is available only for online and does not support on-premise deployments.