In the always evolving world of app development, Canvas Apps stand out for their customizability and flexibility. However, with a great potential for customization comes a unique set of challenges to overcome. Understanding these more common challenges and knowing how to overcome them can greatly help your Canvas App making experience.

Performance Bottlenecks

The number one issue you will most likely run into when developing a complex app with Canvas Apps is a degradation of performance. Due to any heavy customization, your Canvas App can suffer from slow performance, especially when modifying your app through the editor.

Solution: You can optimize your app by minimizing the amount of data visible on one screen at a time. For large galleries that scroll, consider implementing pagination. Try to avoid using non-delegable queries and focus on delegation to offload data processing to the data source itself. As a rule of thumb, the more controls you put on your screen, especially within galleries, the more lag or stuttering you will experience, so also consider removing the less necessary components or placing them elsewhere. Finally, it may also help to close other unused tabs in your browser to get an extra bit of performance when editing.

Building a Dynamically Sized App

Often when building an application, a single developer will use the same monitor & web browser, providing a very limited view of what a user might experience on their own machine. Some may even attempt to access the app through their phones or tablets, creating a unique situation where it is important to build an app that can dynamically change depending on the resolution of the display.

Solution: It is always important to design your app from the ground up with responsiveness in mind. Canvas Apps offers components such as a horizontal or vertical container, which can automatically align the different pieces of your app to better prepare for different resolutions. Additionally, consider utilizing relative positioning and flexible sizing while designing the look of your app. While in the editor, there are built-in ways to “play” a canvas app in different varied resolutions, which should be used when frequently testing a responsive app.

Quick Tips For Troubleshooting and Debugging

open monitor powerapps blog

• • Use the monitor tool feature in PowerApps to perform real-time debugging.
  • Use the app checker, a built-in canvas apps feature that gives useful advice.
  • Check documentation and community posts for insights and solutions.

Conclusion

Creating a Canvas App comes with its distinct challenges, but effectively utilizing the available tools and tips at your disposal can significantly expedite your path towards success. By understanding these challenges and by seeking out best-practice solutions available freely on the web, you can ensure a smoother and more efficient app development process.