App Studio overview
App Studio is a low-code solution that brings users together in one inclusive, intuitive authoring environment that makes building smarter workflows easy, regardless of coding skill level or complexity of the use case. With App Studio, business and IT can have seamless collaboration; business users have the tools that are necessary to be active participants in the development process and react in real time to evolving business needs.
App Studio provides core features for application development, such as case design, data management, and user experience. The design of App Studio targets low-code users, including application developers, front-end developers, data engineers, and business analysts. The no-code visual interface makes development more accessible for a low-code user.
Building the business processes on Case Types, Personas, and data objects is a part of the Pega Express™ delivery approach, in which teams deliver projects in a no-code and user-oriented way. In Pega Express, teams can model business processes in App Studio. A single business process that results in an expected outcome is a Microjourney®, and teams can holistically plan and understand a Microjourney by creating relationships between Cases, Personas, and data objects.
Apart from creating Case Types, Personas, and data objects, you can find the Overview, Channels, Explore data, Library, and configuration settings in the navigation pane in App Studio.
- Overview
Provides basic information about your application, such as Case Types, Personas, data objects, and Channels. - Channels
Configure the Channels where users interact with your application, including Web portal, Web embed, Mobile portal, Digital Messaging, Email, and Alexa. You can also view the APIs exposed by the Pega Platform. - Explore Data
Explore and analyze your application data. You can query your data and sort, filter, and group the results based on your business requirements. - Library
Provides a visual representation of reusable assets (Case Types, Data, and Logic) in the Reuse Library. - Settings
Change application settings at run time by creating configuration settings. You can adjust the application to your business needs in a no-code way.
Pega GenAI™, a new generative AI-powered feature set, is integrated across Pega Platform™. One benefit of Pega GenAI is that it accelerates the low-code application development process by providing suggestions.
Teams can plan for application development by calculating estimations based on the requirements that the team needs to implement. The estimator tool in App Studio provides greater accuracy and efficiency while planning development work to meet the release timelines. With App Studio, teams can track development changes in the context of a feature. Features in an agile development model help you to plan and implement the functions of an application.
App Studio mainly supports application development for low-code users, such as business users and Citizen Developers. However, seasoned developers who want to create Rules for their applications quickly can also use it. As a best practice, use App Studio as the first option to build an application. Professional developers can easily switch to Dev Studio to configure advanced technical options, and then return to App Studio.
App Studio features and benefits
Common tasks that can be accomplished with App Studio:
- Application Packaging, Application Switching, and Application Styling.
- Adding Case Types and Configuring Stages.
- Case Participant Configuration, Personas and User Creation, Persona-Based Portal Configuration using a Simple, Model-Driven Approach.
- Data type and Data Model viewing. Configure fields as Primary Fields in a Data Model to autogenerate consistent Views for Case creation, editing, and detail Views. Adding or updating Primary Fields in the Data Model will automatically update Views. Data Model definition with CSV or XLSX file uploads.
- Explicitly define default Data Pages to enable consistent referencing of data objects and Case Types.
- View configuration and Channel interface creation.
- Page creation and modification (UI Pages) for use in menus to simplify navigation. With pages, you can create landing pages immediately.
- Citizen Developers can edit application names, URLs, descriptions, and business objectives directly in App Studio to provide more context about an application.
- App Studio User Management provides enhanced security configuration features at a Persona level that can be configured on Case Types, data objects, and Configuration Sets.
- Citizen Developers can author decision tables that define conditions that include multiple elements, which results in different outcomes.
- To collect data from users of your application, you can now prepare questionnaires in a low-code and user-friendly way in App Studio without switching to Dev Studio.
- App Studio for a Case type provides an option to navigate to the previous step in a stage. This navigation is limited to within the stage and not available to navigate between stages.
- With App Studio, you can delete all the instances and associated assignments of a Case with Delete Case option. Delete Case Type option deletes all instances and assignments associated with the Case and as well deletes the Case itself. You need to be cautious while using this option, as this will delete the Case Type Rule.
Benefits of App Studio
App Studio accelerates your project by ensuring guardrail compliance, transparency, and visibility. The following table describes how you can also use the App Studio environment for enablement, collaboration, and innovation:
| Enablement | Collaboration | Innovation |
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The following list describes the differences between App Studio and Dev Studio:
- Add value as fast as possible: The design of App Studio can help yield results while saving time.
- Reduce the number of concepts: Dev Studio has over 200 Rule Types. App Studio has low-code forms.
- Contextualize for user needs: Creating an integration in Dev Studio requires opening approximately six different Rule types and understanding how the Rules connect. App Studio has all the Rule Types on one page.
- Use defaults: The fastest application creation method is to build on the default out-of-the-box features rather than start from blank values. With every new application and template, Pega applications use the following defaults:
- Channels
- Data objects
- Roles with every new application (and templates).
- Provide familiar tools and terminology: Dev Studio uses Pega-only terminology. App Studio uses industry-standard terminology, for example, harness versus page or Rule versus object.
- Push the boundaries of UX design: Pega believes that you can simplify anything, including highly complex technology such as machine learning and robotic automations.
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