This document discusses Application Lifecycle Management (ALM) fundamentals in the Power Platform. It defines ALM and the different types, from manual to fully automatic. The core component for ALM in Power Platform is Solutions, which allow components to be grouped and version controlled. Solutions can be unmanaged for development or managed for deployment. The document also covers components, publishers, and the differences between managed and unmanaged solutions. It provides an overview of how updates, upgrades, and patches work with solutions and ALM processes like development, testing, and production.

1. Power Platform ALM
fundamentals
Tomasz Poszytek, MVP

2. The official event app for the Microsoft
Power Platform Conference – Fall 2023
Event Invitation Code:
PPCFall2023
Join the event app to access:

3. Tomasz Poszytek
• Expert in automation
• Independent consultant,
freelancer
• Power Platform enthusiast
• Speaker, organizer of
conferences
• Photographer
• Traveler
https://aka.ms/poszytek
https://youtube.com/tomaszposzyte
k
tomasz@poszytek.eu
@TomaszPoszytek

4. What is ALM?!
📝
Plan
🏗️
Develop
📋
Test
🚀
Deploy
🛠️
Maintain

5. What types of ALM have we in Power
Platform?
Done manually,
no automation
Using export
and import of
solutions
👷
Manual Triggered
manually, but
executed
automatically
Using new
Power Platform
Pipelines
📎
Partially
automatic Trigerred
manually or
automatically,
eg. on schedule
Absolutely
flexible and
adjustable
Using Power
Platform Build
Tools and Azure
DevOps
️
Fully
automatic

6. What is the core component used for ALM
in Power Platform?
SOLUTIONS!

7. Why are so important?
SOLUTIONS
Allow to keep all solution components in a single „folder”
Allow version control (no version history though)
Unmanaged for development and Managed for deployment
Allow different ALM scenarios (update, upgrade and patch)
Are owned by Publishers
Are build from layers (unmanaged and managed)

8. Components
A component represents something that
you can potentially customize. Anything
that can be included in a solution
is a component.

9. Publisher
The solution publisher specifies who
developed the app. For this reason, you
should create a solution publisher name
that's meaningful.

10. Managed vs. Unmanaged or the other way…
Unamanaged
• Used for development
• Can be exported as managed or
unmanaged
• Should be considered as data for
source control system or
backups
Managed
• Used for deployment to other
environments
• Components can’t be edited
directly
• Can protect components with
Managed properties
• Can’t be exported

11. Update, Upgrade and Patch
Update
Creates updates which
are deployed.
It is used to “overwrite”
components.
Upgrade
Makes a differential
check and removes
unused components
and starts upgrade
logic.
Triggers merging all
patches into the new
version.
Can be performed
immediately or be
staged.
Patch
Contains a small set of
changes and new
components.
After import they
create new layers in
managed solutions.
Like hotfixes 

12. All together…
DEV environment
TEST/ QA/ STAGING env.
PRODUCTION

13. ALM in action!
Let’s see how the basic ALM can be performed
for real Power Platform solutions!

14. Further learning
Low-Code to Collaboration: Mastering Source Control
for Power Platform Solutions with Git and GitHub
Yannick Reekmans
Wednesday, 15:15 – 16:15, BLVD Ballroom 163

15. Session Feedback Surveys
We really want to hear from YOU!
In the pursuit of making next year’s Microsoft Power Platform Conference even better,
we want to hear your feedback about this session.
Here’s How -
 Simply go to the Whova App on your smartphone
 Scroll down on the Microsoft Power Platform Conference Homepage to ‘Additional
Resources’ to click “Surveys’.
 Click Session Feedback.
 Scroll down to find this session title.
 Complete the session feedback survey.
 Finally, click ‘Submit’
It’s just that easy!