PowerApps Community Plan not working??

[AmirBakht]

Hi,

So the PowerApps community plan is meant to allow you to develop PowerApps and PowerAutomate solutions in a single user environment allowing you to use premium features without needing the premium license, right? Referring to this: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powerapps/maker/dev-community-plan 

Now when I go in there to create a scheduled Flow with a premium connector (for example a CDS or an Azure Table connector), it asks me to enable Trial. Isn't it supposed to allow me to create them without the license or trial as mentioned in the documentation?

Anybody know whats going on?

[Jcook]

Hello @AmirBakht 

Reading the docs, it seems like only premium connectors are available for use inside Power Apps.

“Power Apps Community Plan gives you access to Power Apps premium functionalities”

for Power Automate premium connectors, you will need a separate license or a trial.

[AmirBakht]

@Jcook it actually says Power Automate as well reading further "Power Apps Community Plan gives you access to Power Apps premium functionalities, Common Data Service, and Power Automate for individual use."  

I doubt it is specific to PowerApps only as throughout the article it mentions for Power Apps, Automate and CDS.

Also, in the same article if you look here https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powerapps/maker/dev-community-plan#which-features-are-included-in-t...  it mentions premium connectors without it being specifically for PowerApps. Also, the rest of the article as well mentions Power Automate and Power Apps side by side so it does seem the idea covers both. It actually starts off as,

If you want to build skills and learn more about Power Apps, Power Automate, and the Common Data Service, the Power Apps Community Plan is the right plan for you. The Power Apps Community Plan gives you a free development environment for individual use, where you can:

• Learn to build business apps and workflows with the full functionality of Power Apps and Power Automate.
• Connect to any data source by using our 100+ out of the box connectors or by creating your own custom connectors.
• Explore how you can use the Common Data Service to build powerful business apps with the common data model and the SDK.
• Export the solutions you create in your individual environment, and publish them on Microsoft AppSource so your customers can test-drive them.

[AmirBakht]

Nobody??

[SimonChalfont]

I agree. It is very confusing. While building an app in the Developer/Community plan/personal environment, what I found was that if I tried to create an automated flow in the "Flows" node of Power Apps (i.e. make.powerapps.com) and tried to use the CDS/Dataverse connector it prompted me to start a trial but no amount of clicking "start trial" worked. The pop-up would be dismissed but the underlying requested action would not be added to the flow. 

Conversely, when I went to the Power Automate native UI (i.e. flow.microsoft.com) and continued to edit that exact flow then was again prompted to start a trial but this time it was accepted, and I could build the flow. Examining the M365 admin center, I could not determine any change to the account's assigned licenses etc. At this point, I have no idea whether the use of CDS/other premium connections is now limited to 30 days or whether it will ignore any further such issues because this flow is in a developer/community plan/personal environment.

Also, despite completing the flow design in the Automate UI, if I try to edit the design of that flow in the Power Apps UI then any time I try to use a premium connector then that same "start a trial" dialog appears. Very frustrating and clearly a case of the Power Apps and Automate teams not being aligned properly around the creation of Community plans and Developer enviornments. 

[AmirBakht]

Thank you for your reply @SimonChalfont . I was starting to think I am the only one using the developer environment and I may be doing something wrong going in that direction. Glad to have a fellow traveler willing to contribute.

I opened a ticket on this with Microsoft about 2 weeks ago. They had a remote session with me and saw the issue but couldn't replicate it from their end, so it was redirected to their back end team. We are now waiting on a response from them. They did confirm that without using the trial, I should be able to create and use premium features both in PowerApps and PowerAutomate regardless of which site I do it from as long as it is in a developer environment. They also confirmed that if I register the trial, it will expire in 30 days.

If you are dependent on this, I would suggest opening a ticket as well.

[AmirBakht]

The support engineer confirmed to me I should be able to use premium connectors. He tested on his own environment and replicating my license and environment, was able to use premium connectors under the community plan. The article updated just days ago specifically mentions you can use premium connectors.

Now they have come back to me with, we have made some changes and decided you can no longer use premium connectors. To quote them, "to use premium connectors with a community plan is no longer supported". 

[AmirBakht]

@SimonChalfont I tried your approach, didn't work for me unfortunately. 

[AmirBakht · Accepted solution]

So here is the response I got from Microsoft,

• Yes, we used to support premium 
• We have now decided not to support premium anymore
• Yes, we know the document still says it is supported even though it is not
• No, we do not have any documentation that says we have changed our mind and you cannot use premium anymore
• Yes, we know you started your project based on our documentation but if you want to continue, you need to pay us
• Why don't you go and make a suggestion on our site that we need to keep our documents updated because it affects decision makers? 

Leaves me speechless!

[Dowsetts101]

HI @AmirBakht a really timely thread as I'm facing a similar situation...but I might have a bit of a solution for you???

Earlier this year I participated in a the Hack4Good event and as part of that Chris Huntingford provided some instructions on how to setup a trial environment, in a slightly different way from the standard documentation. I've managed to have that environment extended a couple of times, to just short of a year. 

Its been really useful, and has had full access to premium connectors and everything else. So for the last while I've been able to evaluate different connectors and play around before considering bringing them into our work tenant.

Only downside, is that now my 1 year is up...and I was going to look at going to an individual PowerApps Community Plan...but based on what you've found out about, looks like thats not going to provide me the functionality I've been using!!!

For what its worth, the YouTube from Chris takes you through his option...which whilst not a permanent one, might help you out for a while anyway???

https://www.youtube.com/watch?edufilter=NULL&v=lfGtjcxeKj4

[AmirBakht]

thanks @Dowsetts101  ... haven't had a chance but will definitely give it a go