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david wyatt
david wyatt

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It's Time to Switch to the New Power Automate UI

For a long while there has been a hidden experimental setting:

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But it was very buggy, and rough around the edges (to say the least). Well Microsoft has been working hard on it, and started talking about it, so it feels like its maybe the time to switch (Just FYI still the odd bug and is still experimental, so missing a few things).

So why switch, well there is one main reason, and 3 good reasons. So lets start with the 3:

Improved Filter Query

This one is marmite, and not complete, but some (especially new developers) will love this.
There is now a new menu for selecting filter queries in SharePoint and Excel. It allows you to select field from dropdown and type:

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Though here's the first missing feature, it only allows 'equals' and 'Starts With'

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Fortunately you can get to all the different types, and if you like me who prefers the old way, by switching back

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Improved Small Screen and Portrait View

Now if you ever tried to use flow on a small screen, or more likely tried to use it in a portrait monitor (Never tried it? Trust me for long flows a portrait view is incredibly useful), then you will notice something. You can't use the expression popup.

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Well with the new UI this annoying UI choice has gone 😊

Nesting Outputs

A small one here, but the more you use it the more you love it. Previously you had to scroll through all parameters to find the action with the parameter you wanted. Well now you can nest each action.

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Improved Expression Window

And this is the big one, trying to write expressions in the old input box was no fun at all (When anything but simple expressions I even use to write mine in VS code and paste back in).

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Well the new UI has a proper space to type expressions, its multiline and allows tabbing.

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Change isn't always easy or welcomed, but after giving it a try, I would definitely recommend making the switch

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