Direction for getting started after doing initial MS "Getting started"

[CCMCCAUGHEY]

I went through the "Getting started" portion of the MS page. Most of it revolved around building out a simple excel sheet and then reading/writing to it with the auto generated app. 

I am trying to build on a inspection sheet with around 125 entries. I wanted to make about 50%  radio buttons, drop down menus, check boxes etc with the other 50% being actual numbers. The auto generated app from the excel sheet looks like it can only really be text entries. 

I'm just trying to get set up correctly upfront. Should I be building the form from scratch or is using the auto generated setup a good jumping off point. From what I can tell there's really no way to format the form and the way the data is entered. Do I need to format my excel sheet and then pull it in?

I have access to SharePoint, and SQL (I think) but I'm not versed in these. I'm willing to learn other software, but I'd prefer to keep it to one thing at a time. I'm just trying to show some proof of concept stuff. If you guys could get me shoved in the right direction I'd really appreciate it. I'm willing to read/learn on my own, but I'm trying to find the right source.

-Chris 

[v-xiaochen-msft]

Hi @CCMCCAUGHEY ,

Welcome to powerapps.

According to your description, I think sharepoint is perfect for you.

The benefits are as follows:

1\ It will store your data in the cloud, which is very convenient and safe to use.

2\ There are many data types of fields in the Sharepoint list. It can satisfy you to use radio, dropdown and other controls.

3\ For beginners, it is easy and it is also one of the mainstream data sources.

In addition, you could learn from Microsoft's official documentation: Here

If you want to learn through video, I recommend you Shane Young’s video: Here

If you still have any question, please don't hesitate to let me know.

Best Regards,

Wearsky

If my post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help others. Thanks.

[CCMCCAUGHEY]

My concern is that SharePoint looks more like a tool for tracking people, project files etc (At least that's the only capacity I've ever seen it used for). I need the data to be in a format that allows me to trend, graph etc. Some questions are "yes/no" or just something I need them to acknowledge they looked at it. The current paper form gets filled out twice a day so that 250 total entries a day. I've never seen SharePoint formatted to accept or display that much information.

My inclination is to work harder at learning how to build out the form menu from scratch rather than the pre-load so that I can direct it at the excel sheet I've already started or possibly start doing some light reading on SQL.  Am I thinking correctly ?

[v-xiaochen-msft]

Hi @CCMCCAUGHEY ,

Happy holiday.

Firstly, sharepoint list supports many commonly used data types. You could refer to the picture below. Could they meet your needs?

Secondly, powerapps could customize forms and other controls, or preload them. Users could choose according to their needs.

If you want to make an app from scratch, you could learn the properties of commonly used controls and some commonly used functions.

Here is the link to learn the properties of the control: Here

Here is the link to learn functions: Here

Best Regards,

Wearsky

If my post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help others. Thanks.

[CCMCCAUGHEY]

I'm going to read up on SharePoint, but at a glance it looks like it is more for a public facing display of my data, and it seems inefficient to write from powerapps to SharePoint then export that data to excel V.S. writing directly to excel if you don't want or need most people to see or use that data. I could just live with text/numbers/and some drop downs with set values.

Thank you for the help.

Edit: I may have found the correct instructions from Shane's videos. Once I get through them I will post them and close this out with a solution.

[Drrickryp]

Hi @CCMCCAUGHEY 

The different connectors are just ways of storing the data in tables.  PowerApps is a front end for displaying, entering, updating and removing the data stored in the tables. The main reason to use one or the other depends mostly on the size of the tables. IMHO, Excel is a good sandbox and is useful for the simplest of databases.  SharePoint is better for tables up to 2000 items, but Dataverse (Common Data Service) and SQL are the best and can handle millions of records. 
However, before getting serious, there are two important concepts to understand when designing in PowerApps, the first is Delegation https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powerapps/maker/canvas-apps/delegation-overview  and the second is the relationships between related tables and the principles of database design.  https://powerusers.microsoft.com/t5/News-Announcements/Database-Design-Fundamentals-and-PowerApps-An... .  A review of these posts will help you decide which connectors to use and then how to avoid common pitfalls common with new developers in PowerApps. 

[CCMCCAUGHEY · Accepted solution]

@Drrickryp 

Thank you for the links. I'm going to read them. Ultimately I'd like to have a thorough understanding of what I'm going. 

For a simple data entry tool I ended up finding this helpful. I needed to setup seperate tables with entries. and then modify the input to a drop down and then point  to that table. Maybe that's obvious to more versed users, but wasn't intuitive to someone getting started. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqH1U0_TanI&t=594s 

I'd really like to get proficient at this. I see a lot of potential uses and it being tied into MS ecosystem takes some variables out for me. I think I have enough to show some POC to the people might be interested in it.