12 lookup column limit: PA to SharePoint - NEED HELP

[Daryl_K]

I have been ordered to replace an aging Infopath solution using Power Apps this spring. The solution must connect to a corporate SharePoint list that has a large number of columns, and clearly way more than the prescribed 12.

The list is not mine and I have no control over it, so deleting or changing columns is not even a remote possibility. The owner would permit me to make a View, and I could live with one that has fewer than 12 lookup columns, but as PA does not obey Views this is not a valid solution.

I have been searching the forums for weeks and the only suggestion I have found is using Flow to get filtered items to your Power App, but the instructions are poor and I have been unable to get it to work, nor have I found anyone else who was able to get it to work to ask about it. I have found numerous conversations with input from Microsoft saying a fix to allow PA to obey Views is being considered, but no word if this will happen this year, this decade, or at all.

C'mon Microsoft, throw me a bone! I was able to establish this same data connection 7 years ago using Infopath. How can it be that after so long Power Apps is still unable to do the same? Are there any workable solutions now or on the immediate horizon???

[WarrenBelz]

OK @Daryl_K ,

You might want to post this on the Power Automate Community - you should be able to get a response there.

[Daryl_K]

See this post from about a month ago: https://powerusers.microsoft.com/t5/Connecting-To-Data/Getting-data-from-a-very-large-SharePoint-lis...

That's where I got the link to the article that no one can get to work. 

MS says adding the ability to obey Views is "under review" but no one can say if that's a week, month or 5 years off, and I cannot wait much linger.

[WarrenBelz]

Thanks @Daryl_K ,

It would have been good if you had referred to this at the start - it might have saved us both some conversation.

As I found in the end, this is really your only option and it is still "under review" (I have several I want that have been there for a couple of years)

[Daryl_K]

Well, I probably could have been more specific, but I did mention this in my original post:

I have been searching the forums for weeks and the only suggestion I have found is using Flow to get filtered items to your Power App, but the instructions are poor and I have been unable to get it to work, nor have I found anyone else who was able to get it to work to ask about it.

Also, the title did correctly outline the actual issue I was facing - the 12 lookup limitation from SharePoint.

Thanks for your feedback just the same. Your comment on "couple of years" does not inspire me with much hope however. Guess I'll have to move on with Infopath (again). I hope MS "matures" PA enough to meet the needs of power users.

[WarrenBelz]

No problem @Daryl_K ,

I do understand your frustration - I like you are a user relying on workarounds for at times seemingly simple things that should work out of the box. Delegation is probably the biggest one where SQL will rip into 1.2 million records and return a lookup in a second.

[vnevitt]

@Daryl_K, did you ever find a reasonable work-around for this? I've got a SP list that contains ~150 columns, 50-60 of which are People fields, so I'm running into the same situation. I'm building some approval workflows (so the various stakeholders and stakeholder groups and sign off at each stage gate) and we'll also be using Power Apps for some record views. Anything you can share might be helpful, this is very frustrating. 

[Daryl_K]

Not one that was desired. Effectively I removed the look ups altogether, then made those fields manual with as much authentication as is possible. This still left room for error, so in my Power BI report I have a compliance page report now that highlights entries that have no match (due to incorrect ID entry).

It's somewhat effective, but a royal PITA.