Tree view has an “App” item to make app building easier

There’s a fancy new item in the tree view and its name is “App”.  This App item is not a control, but is permanently there and contains properties of your app such as OnStart.

In previous versions, the OnStart property was included in the property list of the first screen of your app. The feedback we received was that this was 1) confusing and 2) hard to find. By introducing a dedicated place to find your app properties we have addressed these issues.

The most exciting part however, is the ability to run the OnStart property of the app without closing, then re-opening the authoring experience. Now with the click of a button, you can execute the OnStart property to refresh variables, create collections and test the OnStart property quicker and easier than before.  Variables and collections are not cleared automatically when the OnStart is executed so you may want to start using ClearCollect instead of Collect for loading collections.

To run the App property OnStart, select the App item in the tree view. Select the ellipses (…) context menu, and then select “Run OnStart.”

You will notice other properties start to appear at the App level, such as OnError. Those will be introduced appropriately with blogs and explanations.  We know many people are eager for a global error handler.  However the OnError that is exposed here is only a placeholder that will go through many changes before it is ready; stay tuned to the this blog for updates.

As always, we value your feedback. Let us know in the blog comments or the community forums what you think!