canvas apps production ready?

[Kran]

I heard from someone that canvas apps are not production ready. Is that true?

[mdevaney · Accepted solution]

@Kran
No, that person is wrong. 1000s of companies use PowerApps everyday without issue.

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[shannonbdavis]

I think it would be easier to answer this question if you defined "production-ready". Otherwise, it is a matter of opinion whether someone else thinks its production ready or not.

For me production-ready means I can move it in a solution to different environments (can do), that it will be stable (not sure yet), and that when I move it between environments, it's aware of what the current environment is.

For example, I'm hoping when I promote my app to my QA environment, it starts to reference the entities on QA rather than the entities on our DEV env.  

[cds]

PowerApps itself is production ready. but it does have its limitations. 

It takes sometime to get your own skill production ready though.

[Guillaume_Ki]

Hello.

EDIT : My bad, i just though Environment Makers was enough for solutions which is not. Still trying to figure out the correct rights in Dynamics.

[rssilvaba]

I would say it is not. I would never recommend anyone to use/suggest PowerApps as a application solution for a client. Editor is really buggy, many times I have to browse over the versions to restore things or close without saving hoping that I will find things close to the way they were.

Support is very limited. I reported an issue a week ago and no replies, I do not know if it a bug or not. But my app basically now only works in the preview. Two weeks ago it was working fine. If they release a version and your clients update the PowerApps clients and bug is introduced you have to came up with a fix for something not done by you. So you have very little control on that. I can't even find an issue tracker for god's sake.

Canvas Apps are useful if you want to do:
-Quick and dirty customization of a SharePoint form.
- small apps, 1-2 model entity
- does not require to be responsive
- need a simple app that can be viewed either on a phone or a tablet.

Main things I would never recommend PowerApps for:
- Big apps (more than 5 screen/many entity model)
- Data hungry apps (multiple connections and concurrent calls )
- heavy backend apps. SQL backed apps, etc.
- and especially responsive apps. People have the misconception that Canvas apps can be turned responsive easily but don't be fooled by the internet tuts, it will not work as intended because PowerApps does not have responsiveness as core concept (proper scaling, scalable units, like sp in android ). You either create a phone app or a table app. A single app that works in every device will require much more time than doing it as webapp, for example. 

Obviously my view is biased as anyone else here, Mainly because I mostly work with JS and HTML. So I will always try to suggest projects on the field that I am most comfortable with. If you are just an user and you have no coding experience PowerApps can be a good start.
But you are a developer with some experience you are probably better off it.
If you are part of a team and you think your colleagues would enjoy making apps with it, remember that the clients rarely care about the tool you use just the result. In this sense it will always be easier to use JS + UI framework.