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Errors - What to do when creating an app with the 'start with data' feature fails

If you attempt to create an app using the 'start with data' feature and the screen becomes 'stuck', here's what you can do to diagnose the problem.

The new 'start with data' feature is a great enhancement that enables app builders to very quickly build responsive apps based on existing data sources. Through a wizard-type interface, it builds an app that looks like beneath.


However, there are some rare circumstances where this feature can fail. This post demonstrates this scenario and describes the steps we can take to diagnose the issue.

Creating an app with 'Start with Data' fails - Demonstration

To demonstrate this problem, we'll use the 'start with data' feature to build an app based on an Excel data source. We access this feature from the home screen of the Power Apps marker portal, choose 'Connect to Data', and select Excel as the data source.

This opens the screen shown beneath. After completing the details, we select the 'create app' button but nothing happens. We remain on the same screen and the button remains clickable. We're stuck on this screen.


How to diagnose 'Start with Data' failures

The problem is that the 'start with data' feature doesn't return data source errors back to the app maker.

To diagnose this problem, we can create a blank app and attempt to connect to the same Excel data source. When we attempt this method, Power App displays a dialog that provides full details of the error. In this case, the cause of the error is that the spreadsheet exceeds the maximum row size.


Once we understand the cause of the problem, we can correct the data source and attempt to recreate the app with the 'start of data' feature.

Conclusion

If the 'start with data' feature fails to create an app, it's possible that a problem exists with the data source. We can attempt to identify the specific cause by creating an empty app and connecting to the data source.
  •   Categories: 
  • bug
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