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Articles by April Dunnam
Meet the Agent Academy Hackathon Winners
From May 12 to June 2, 2026, builders from around the world put their Agent Academy learning to the test by designing, building, and shipping real, working AI agents with Copilot Studio. After two weeks of judging, we’re thrilled to announce the Agent Academy Hackathon winners. 🏆 The Winners The Recruit track is geared toward exploring the fundamentals of agent building and is optimized for first-time agent builders.
Agent Academy Spring Drop: Special Ops, Cowork Collective, and a Whole New Look
We’ve shipped a big round of updates to Agent Academy. Two new sections, a completely redone site experience, and more missions on the way. Here’s what’s changed. Quick recap for anyone new Agent Academy is a free, open-source curriculum for learning how to build agents with Microsoft Copilot Studio. Since launching in August 2025, it has crossed one million views, which tells us the community is hungry for guided, hands-on content around building and using agents.
Dataverse Skills: Your Coding Agent Now Speaks Dataverse
Building enterprise solutions is shifting from writing code to directing AI agents. Instead of stitching together APIs, CLIs, and scripts, developers are increasingly describing intent and letting agents execute. For enterprise platforms like Dataverse, this creates a new requirement: they must be operable by agents, not just by humans.
Announcing Agent Academy: Operative
Earlier this year, we launched Agent Academy: Recruit, a foundational learning path designed to help makers and developers get started with building agents in Copilot Studio. The response exceeded our expectations. Since launch, thousands of learners have worked through the Recruit curriculum, and through the Global AI Community we’ve issued 500+ badges to people who finished the path.
Announcing Copilot Studio Agent Academy: Your Mission Starts Now
Whether you’re just starting your journey with AI agents or looking to sharpen your skills in Microsoft Copilot Studio, we’ve got your mission briefing ready and it’s time to suit up! We’re thrilled to introduce Copilot Studio Agent Academy, a new, self-paced curriculum designed to help makers, developers, and AI-curious professionals learn how to build real, useful agents using Microsoft Copilot Studio. No more theoretical fluff.
Microsoft Copilot Studio ❤️ MCP
Ever wished your AI agents could tap into live data or execute actions beyond their built-in capabilities? Enter Model Context Protocol (MCP)—a game-changer for integrating external tools and data sources directly into your Copilot Studio agents. 🧠 What is MCP? Think of MCP as a universal adapter for AI applications. It standardizes how AI models access external tools, APIs, and knowledge bases.
Announcing the winners of the 2025 Powerful Devs Hack Together
The 2025 Powerful Devs Hack Together brought developers together to build secure and scalable AI-powered solutions using Power Platform, Azure, AI Builder, and more. If you missed the event, you can still catch up on all the sessions covering AI, automation, security, extensibility, and more! π₯ Watch here: aka.ms/powerfuldevs/ondemand Technologies Used in the Hackathon β―We loved seeing developers use so many different technologies to build their hack.
Announcing Powerful Devs Conference + Hack Together 2025
We are excited to invite you to participate in this year’s Powerful Devs Conference + Hack Together, starting on February 12, 2025. The conference will be followed by a two-week Hack Together, ending on February 28, 2025.
The Development Spectrum of Microsoft 365 and Power Platform
Published on Sep 13 2024 12:44 PM (PDT) by Mark Kashman Microsoft Edited on Sep 13 2024 04:59 PM (PDT) It's a balance of knowing what skills to use, and when - blended with thoughtful 'build versus buy' decision making criteria. This webinar looks left-to-right across the full spectrum of options within Microsoft 365 and Power Platform - from no-code to low-code, to pro-code. Each presenter will represent one area on the spectrum.
We are deprecating earlier versions of Visual Studio for Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations development
August 29th, 2024 Microsoft will no longer be shipping or supporting the Visual Studio extensions supporting development work against Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations, and for the Power Platform tools, for Visual Studio versions other than Visual Studio 2022. What will change?
Create scripts with Power Platform CLI
August 15th, 2024 The Power Platform CLI is a great tool to use when you are working with the Power Platform. You can create Power Apps Component Framework (PCF) components with it, you can do tons of administrative actions, and much more! You can run these one by one in the console when you’re developing a Power Platform solution, but sometimes, you want to use multiple commands together. In this blog, I will show you how you can create scripts with Power Platform CLI.
Announcing a new Learn module: Create a copilot to help promote your podcast
July 31st, 2024 Microsoft Learn has always been a way to learn new skills and concepts and discover the power of Microsoft products with step-by-step guidance. Recently, there has been an increase of learn paths and modules that throw you further into the deep end allowing you to develop new skills by building an end-to-end solution or project.
Announcing a new Learn module: Use service principal authentication in custom connectors
July 19th, 2024 Connectors are one of the superpowers of the Microsoft Power Platform. They link the Power Platform to a vast array of external services and applications. Over 1200 connectors are available now out of the box. But – what if the API you want to connect to doesn’t have an out of the box connector? Or the existing connector doesn’t do what you need? Or your company has custom APIs that they want to use with the Power Platform?
The Unified Development Environment is GA!
June 6th, 2024 We are proud to announce that the Unified Developer Experience for Finance and Operations apps (colloquially known as UDE) is now generally availablity for all customers. As you may know, UDE is both the next step in the app development experience for Finance and Operations, and a powerful enabler for leveraging the value provided by Microsoft Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform.
Adding Generative AI to your Power Apps with AI Prompts
Did you know that you can harness the power of GPT in your Power Apps applications? You can leverage the built-in AI Builder Create Text with GPT model to create your own custom prompts and use those easily in Power Apps by adding them as a data source. Check out this video to see how it's done: Adding Generative AI to your Power Apps with AI Prompts - YouTube Learn how to enhance your Power Apps canvas apps with generative AI capabilities.
Adding generative AI to your Cloud Flows with AI Prompts
AI innovation in the Power Platform keeps getting better and better! Now an AI prompt can be added as an action within a Power Automate flow making it possible to generate text from inside an automated process. In this video, @gomomohapi shows how you can add these Generative AI capabilities to your flows. Showing you how to configure the flow with the AI Prompt, how to retrieve user information and how to add an approval step for human review of the AI generated content.
Getting started with AI Prompts
We're kicking off a brand new multi-week video series called "AI in Action - Powering up with Power Automate'. In this series, we'll explore some of the key generative AI features in Power Automate and AI Builder that are changing the automation game. In the first video of the series, we'll be tackling AI Prompts. AI Prompts are powered by GPT and run on the Azure OpenAI Service.
Create multilingual copilots with the Power Platform CLI and Microsoft Copilot Studio
February 27th, 2024 A while ago, it became possible to create multilingual copilots in Microsoft Copilot Studio. It’s easy to enable the setting and have multiple languages in your copilot, but do you know how to translate your copilot into a different language? In this blog, I will show you how it can be done! This blog is part of a multi-part series on the Power Platform CLI.
This Is Why: Women in Tech and That Unwanted Commentary
The tech industry is all about innovation and breaking down barriers. But for women in tech, especially those who share their knowledge online, it's not always easy. I recently had an experience that reminded me of the challenges women face in this field. I make technical videos on YouTube – a passion project of mine for the past 5 years. In those 5 years I've encountered every type of troll imaginable.
Unlock Retail Productivity with Power Platform and Dataverse
January 12th, 2024 This year at the National Retail Federation’s (NRF) Big Show we will highlight how Power Platform can help unlock productivity and improve customer experiences in your retail shopping experiences. Store associates can face many challenges, including dealing with backorders and stockouts on items. Often, this is caused by data being scattered across multiple enterprise systems and data sources. It is nearly impossible to identify and mitigate risks with these challenges.
Power Platform Command Line Interface: October/November Updates
December 8th, 2023 We’re excited to announce the new updates released in Power Platform CLI October and November updates. There are a number of improvements that we have made for you, our developer community, and we want to share with you to help overcome roadblocks and make process enhancements. The development team, our PM team, and I are thankful for your continued support.
Announcing the Livestream Series - Let’s Learn Power: A Real-life AI + Power Platform Use Case
December 7th, 2023 Unlocking Value with the Power Platform For years now, the Power Platform has been a low code tool that unlocks value across your business by accelerating application & automation development to meet business demand faster. Whether you’re a professional developer, an IT admin, business analyst, or a non-technical employee, low code empowers you to create solutions in a fast, secure, and compliant fashion.
Power Platform CLI - Simplifying authentication profiles.
December 6th, 2023 Good day developers! Power Platform CLI is a one stop command line interface to interact with Power Platform – aka PAC CLI. We have 3 different kinds of authentication profiles. In the version 1.16 of PAC CLI, we started to deprecate the parameter --kind and since then, UNIVERSAL is the default profile kind. In this post, I will explain why we have different authentication profile kind, what is the intention of each type and what kind of profile you should use.
Build your next application on Dataverse - now with hyperscale support for any enterprise data
December 4th, 2023 Dataverse, Microsoft’s modern and scalable business application platform in the cloud, enables developers to build enterprise-grade applications at hyperscale. Today, Dataverse encompasses over 3.5 million Azure SQL databases and leverages Azure SQL Hyperscale to support up to 100 TB per individual database–with rapid scale up, rapid scale out, and high availability.
The Visual Studio 2022 add-in is now available for Dynamics 365 for Financials and Operations.
November 7th, 2023 TL;DR: The Dynamics 365 for Finance and Operations Visual Studio add-in is now available for use in Visual Studio 2022 (VS 2022). Visual Studio 2022 is the first 64-bit version of Visual Studio. We wanted to take advantage of the stability it brought (and set us up for the future) and this gave us the opportunity to rework and rethink some of our code.
VHDs and CHEs with One box deployments available now (VHD FinandOps10.0.37)
November 7th, 2023 TL;DR We have published updated virtual machines (VHD) and cloud hosted environments (CHE) containing the latest bits, scheduled to be released in the first week of November 2023. The new VHD Developer One-box image is based on Windows Server 2022 Datacenter. The image contains both the Visual Studio (VS) 2019 and VS 2022 versions (in the professional SKU). The VHD ships with the Platform Update 61/App 10.0.37 payload installed.
Announcing the HackTogether: Power Platform Global AI Hack Winners
October 24th, 2023 We’re excited to announce the winners of HackTogether: The Power Platform Global AI Hack In this HackTogether we got the opportunity to see the power of AI Copilots in the Power Platform. We learned from advocates and other experts about Copilots, AI Builder, using Azure OpenAI service, and we even got a tutorial on using GitHub so you can share your AI powered Power Platform solutions with the community.
Power Platform Global AI Hack Week 1 Recap
September 26th, 2023 Week 1 Recap and What’s Coming The first full week of the Power Platform Global AI #HackTogether was a lot of fun! We saw some amazing walkthroughs and demos from our talented experts, who showed us how to integrate AI in our Power Platform applications. Now it’s your turn to take that inspiration and put it into your prize-winning solution! Speaking of solutions… This is the last week of the hackathon and you have less than a week to submit your solution.
Power Platform Global AI #HackTogether Keynote Recap and What’s Coming
September 20th, 2023 Last week we launched The Power Platform Global AI #HackTogether – a virtual hackathon all about using AI in the Power Platform. Here’s what happened last week and what’s still to come. Week 0 Recap Last week, we kicked off the virtual hackathon with a keynote by Ryan Cunningham (Vice President, Power Apps). Ryan gave an insightful presentation on how AI can empower developers to create smarter and more intuitive applications.
Hack Together: The Power Platform AI Global Hack
August 24th, 2023 Are you ready to unleash your creativity and build amazing solutions with Microsoft Power Platform and AI? If so, join us for Hack Together: Power Platform AI Global Hack, a virtual event where you can learn, experiment, and hack together with the new Copilot and AI features in the Power Platform. Hack Together is a global online hackathon that runs from September 14th to 28th, 2023.
Fueling Creativity: Introducing our Power Platform Prompt Samples Repository!
May 16th, 2023 We are thrilled to announce the launch of our new Power Platform Prompt Samples library, housed on Github! This repository is dedicated to showcasing a variety of prompts that can be used to power up your experiences in the Power Platform using GPT models. So, get ready to unleash your creativity and take your Power Platform projects to new heights! Imagine you have a magical tool that can generate text based on the input you provide. That’s where prompts come into play.
Welcome to the Power Platform Developer Blog
May 10th, 2023 Welcome to the Power Platform Developer Blog! We are excited to have a space to collaborate directly with you – our Power Platform developers.
Azure App Modernization with Power Apps
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Powerful Devs Conference
Sep 09 2021 12:07 PM Want to learn about how to leverage Fusion Teams and the Power Platform to build applications faster and with less code? Join our experts at #PowerfulDevsConf on Sep 14, 8–11:30 PT (GMT+8). You'll hear from community members, Microsoft MVP's and Microsoft execs. This is a LIVE event with a variety of topics ranging from custom connectors to ALM and more! Scott Guthrie will kick things off with a fireside chat on why code-first devs should embrace the Power Platform.
WFH Hack - Smart Busy Lights
The COVID 19 pandemic has caused many of us to have to work from home. If you have housemates, it can prove to be difficult to keep them out of your home office when you’re in a meeting. I had an idea to get a light that I could turn Red so other know “None Shall Pass” and Green for “You May Enter”. While researching this idea, I stumbled upon Todd Klindt’s blog about his solution: https://www.toddklindt.com/blog/Lists/Posts/Post.aspx?ID=864. He uses stick on LED lights around his office door.
PowerApps Security Trimming Options
by April Dunnam · August 16, 2019 A common requirement when building out forms/applications in PowerApps is to apply security trimming to elements in your app. Take this scenario for example: You have a form which requires an approval. You only want certain users to be able to click the button to mark the form as approved. As with anything in PowerApps, there are multiple ways that you can accomplish this.
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