Introducing the new view designer for model-driven apps

Yesterday we announced the new model-driven designer coming to preview, and today, I’d like to announce that we’re also releasing the new view designer in preview. The experience brings with it several improvements to the classic view designer, like being able to see a preview of your data or to make simple inline edits on the canvas. The following represent just a few of the key features shipping with this preview version of the view designer.

Adding new columns is now easier than ever. You can now easily add columns using the plus button in the canvas or by selecting fields in the left hand field drawer. Both experiences provide a search box to quickly and easily find the field you’re looking for.

The new view designer now supports drag-and-drop. With drag-and-drop capabilities, you can now easily reorder columns and resize columns to the perfect width, and thanks to the live preview, you no longer have to save and publish to determine if your column widths are right.

Filtering and sorting is just a click away. You can now add filters and sorting inline in the canvas and manage all of your sort and filter logic in the property pane. You can even click on the edit filters button to open up the advanced expression builder to filter on fields not in your view.

To start using the new view designer, select one of your entities under data and then click on the view pivot. This will bring up a list of all of your views. From there, you can select an existing view or create a new one. As we polish the view designer, we’ll also add entry points to it from other areas, like from the Unified Interface for Dynamics 365.

If you’re looking for even more detailed instructions on how to use the new view designer, check out our view documentation. There we have step-by-step instructions on how to complete common tasks like adding a filter and adding a column. We also call out some of the features in the docs that the latest view designer is currently missing, like custom controls and conditional images, so that you can know what is possible in the current release.

As always, we’re always interested in feedback

As you start playing around with the view designer, feel free to reach out to me on the forums to share your thoughts. As mentioned before, since the new view designer is still in preview, there are still a few features missing, like drag-and-drop support from the field drawer and the ability to edit column headers, but rest assured, these features will be coming soon. If you do need functionality from the classic view designer, simply press the open in classic button in the command bar.