Deployment of Leave-Request APP template. Sensitive data FAIL!

[DSgUY]

Hi, I have installed and edited the leave request app in my personal office365 business folder. I publish the app and share it to a work colleague as USER. He started the app but the Excel record of his session is not created. I think has something to do to the permission of the excel.

I use the Leave Request template version that is connected to an Excel spreadsheet to store all the data of the app.

I don't want to expose the excel to all my work colleagues for confidence reasons. Do I have to?. 

Regards.

[RandyHayes]

@DSgUY 

Yes, you will have to share the file from your OneDrive for others to be able to write to it.  If your app writes to a datasource, then users will need to have access to it in order to write.

I hope this is helpful for you.

[DSgUY]

Woow! thanks for your ultra fast reply!.

I can't do that. It must be a work around to this because it means that every powerapp created expose the database to the users?

[RandyHayes]

@DSgUY 

Yes, it is really no different than any other application.  If you had a SQL based application that users needed to write to, then they would need access to it...

The only other way around it is to utilize PowerAutomate to put items into a datasource.  It is not clean.  For Excel, you would not be able to do this method.  For SharePoint you could.  Or you could combine SharePoint as a repository for your leave requests, have PowerAutomate trigger off of changes or additions to that list and then within the PowerAutomate flow, have it add a row to an excel file or transfer to another private list.

Again, not real easy...

[DSgUY]

Maybe I not deploying the app correctly.

I share the app from the powerapp make page when I was editing the Leave Request Template. I enter his email and select USER profile. My colleague received an email notification and start using it. When opened he is not seeing the days count etc. With my user I checked the data file and I saw that his record (row) was not created.

I undersand that he uses the excel for saving the data but if I also share the excel he will be able to see the records of other colleagues, right? I dont want that. If like seeing all the database of an app.

[RandyHayes]

@DSgUY 

That is correct and that is the nature of using Excel as a data source.  All users must be able to have access to it - otherwise, they will see nothing and not be able to write/update anything to it.

Again, it's like any data source, if users can't access it, they can't do anything with it.

[DSgUY]

ok. can I change something, use another thing to achive what I want? Despite your early reply.

[RandyHayes]

@DSgUY 

Yes, you can re-read my second message to you. There are some workarounds listed there.

[DSgUY]

yes, Im reading that answer.  I use excel because it was by default in the leave-request app. I can use anything else that works. I was reading about Common Data Service but I think is a premium feature. Maybe with sharepoint as you suggest?

[Anonymous]

I'm also facing the same issue here and many others too. A thread was created by me few weeks ago. 

https://powerusers.microsoft.com/t5/Building-Power-Apps/PowerApps-Leave-Request-Data-source-loophole...

Somehow all the workaround require extensive changes to the nature of the program and it will change the user experience so I think it really defeats the purpose.

I'm not sure if SharePoint list will work for as there is an option to 'view items created by you'. Really hope Microsoft can come out with something that can resolve this huge flaw.