Hello AppSheet Community,
One of the team’s goals is to make it easier for all app creators to build applications by bringing focus to the core concepts and tasks and by providing information and “shortcuts” in the relevant context. We rolled out some of these changes in October and shared this initial announcement.
We’re now excited to announce 2 new updates are starting to roll out today. They are follow-ups to the October changes.
First, we’re introducing a secondary navigation that lets you see at a quick glance all your components - whether we’re talking about is your data, your views, format rules, actions and automation components. This should also let you access any individual component more quickly.
As part of this change, suggestions will be available for all components and will be more targeted based on the context you are in (e.g. which Table you are creating a Format Rule for). You’ll also notice that error and warning messages are now shown via a status icon that is always visible in the header.
Secondary navigation menu (left) and Error & Warning status in header bar (top right)
Second, in the same spirit as earlier changes and to be able to make a specific edit to your app without jumping into a different context, there are more direct links in your View component to the table, column or action that you want to check or edit. For example, when you are working on a Deck View, you should not need to click 3, 4 or even 5 times just to check the settings of a column or of an action. This should make more obvious what is possible, especially for users who are new to AppSheet, and make navigation throughout your app components faster.
GIF showing accessing relevant components quickly and editing them on the fly
The secondary navigation menu and its associated changes will be available to everyone. Similarly to the primary navigation menu rolled out in October, you can revert to the legacy navigation patterns if you’re facing an issue. Details are in the FAQ section below.
Let us know if you have any feedback.
Thank you
The AppSheet Team
FAQ
How do I opt in and out of the navigational changes?
App creators can currently opt-in and out of the navigation changes at will. The changes apply to the App Editor experience, independent of the app you are editing. You can opt in and out by clicking on this icon in the top navigation bar.
Is there some documentation?
Yes, we’re updating the relevant pages in our documentation. We’re also introducing a new page that summarizes the changes across the Editor. See Summary of improvements in the app editor (preview).
Where do I report issues and provide feedback?
Contact Support or directly in this thread.
Are you planning on maintaining the two navigation models?
Long term, no, we’re moving towards the new navigational model. For the next few months, we will support both navigation models as we make additional changes to how people navigate through the Editor. We want to work out the kinks before it becomes the only one.
When will the legacy navigational model be unavailable?
We don’t have a hard set date on this. That will depend on how fast we can work out the kinks in the new navigation.
Why don’t I see anything yet?
We’re rolling out these changes progressively and it might take a few days to a few weeks before you can see them in your own account.
I provided some feedback on the previous changes (from October). Are you taking it into account?
We did read the feedback provided by our community. We may not have addressed it yet - whether it’s making an update or it’s deciding not to make any changes.
Thanks @Shahaf
OK for the fisrt issue
For the second, I still think everything that exists should be visible
Happy holidays!
ICYMI: You can still get to the Settings view configuration using the legacy editor.
The user settings views should now be visible in the navigation, thank you for reporting that.
@Guillermo wrote:
I still think everything that exists should be visible
I agree.
I am LOVING the "component" navigation feature - the ability to navigate directly to referenced actions and referenced columns.
Can we we please expand that capability to all areas of the Editor? For instance:
AND anywhere else it might sense to do so in the Editor. This small navigation shortcuts save so much time!!
NOTE: Action navigation is probably the priority!
@WillowMobileSys wrote:
Remembrance of how we left the state?
This is quite important to me because my app is quite big now.
@WillowMobileSys wrote:
Remembrance of how we left the state?
I'm not sure if this has been reported yet but when I tried to add a new slice in the new editor, I had to wait a long time for the AI to make a suggestion that I ignored anyway. I couldn't do anything while waiting. The reason it took so long is that my app is very big. If we could disable this or click on "Skip suggestion" or something, that would be good.
Note that I had plenty of time to do the screenshot.
Is this consistent? The api can be slow sometimes for big complex apps. I am working on improving latencies.
You should still be able to click on the create a new slice button to create a slice even when suggestions are loading.
Yes. Thank you. After posting, I realized that I can click on the "Create a new slice button." Now that I know about this, it's not a major problem for me. Initially, however, it's not very intuitive. I'm not sure what would be better but there may but some other way to configure the interface that's more intuitive.
Since yesterday, every time I delete a format rule, view, OCR model (or anything) the editor freezes until it crashes and I have to reload the page and therefore I loose all my unsaved progress plus I can't delete anything. 😓
Let me investigate and see if I can figure it out
Thanks, this is since I got the update for the editor. I'm still not able to delete format rules and OCR models so far.
Ok - to unblock you you can switch back to the old layout (via the button in the top navigation) and delete what you need while I'm figuring this out.
Thanks, I didn't know.
Pd: I tested to see if it was the computer or the internet connection but still get the same issue.
Edit: The issue was solved with the legacy editor.
Ok I'm glad you aren't blocked, thank you for trying those things out I'm sure it's an issue on our end. I think I've fixed it actually and will message here when it's deployed if you wish to test it out (hopefully Monday, but since you are able to unblock yourself I don't think it's a rush).
Thanks, and sure, I'll be glad to test it on Monday or whenever it is deployed.
Can you try it out now? My fix should be deployed now.
It is working fine for me.
Thanks!
How do we search a column name with the new UI App editor? I use column name search all the time. I have some column names that are uniform across multiple tables. 😞 and I update all of these same name columns in one go by just searching the column name.
At the top of the list of tables...
There is kind of a redundancy of icons, from my point of view 🙂
Ahhh I was just answering Eduardo's question on how to search for column names 😀
Whilst it does look as if there are two search icons, the text box with the second icon only appears after clicking the top icon.
@scott192 Please test the search feature you recommended. I think you will find that, in fact, it does NOT do what @Eduardo_Jr_Vill is asking about:
https://www.googlecloudcommunity.com/gc/Announcements/Further-usability-improvements-simplifying-nav...
This issue is known but as of yet unaddressed (I just checked).
Thanks but I wanted to be able to Search and shows two tables in one view. Similar to this.
And maybe I was hoping the new App editor can filter out columns based on searched. I have countless columns in one table so that actually helps
Yes, as I wrote above, this is a problem that needs to be addressed:
https://www.googlecloudcommunity.com/gc/Announcements/Further-usability-improvements-simplifying-nav...
Hello community - I do know about this issue and have a sort of fix. I'm working on how to solve this properly, as in the old ui when you search on the column tab you can't search by table - but now that they're consolidated I think it'd be weird to not allow someone to search by the table name. But if someone searches by table name and we filter out columns, then when they click on the table it'll be empty (or it'll only have columns that match the tables name). So, trying to figure that out but work on this is in progress.
A suggestion here:
In the legacy editor, we have the possibility to click on the "Expand view" icon, which allow to directly enter an expression in the Show/Require/Editable_If icons.
In the new editor, as far as I know it's not possible.
Can you add this option in the three-dots section?
Thank you very much for your consideration !
BTW: I truly LOVE the new editor interface, great job !!!
New, minor issue in the New Editor.
There apparently has been a recent change so that when the emulator is collapsed, the Columns table expands to fill up the space. Nice!!!
However, it appears an issue is now appearing that cuts off the final column row. See image below. I found if I switch to "Legacy Editor" and back, the problem is "sort of" resolved. I can see all details clearly but the row itself is still slightly cutoff.
I am not sure how long the problem has been there. I have been using the Editor all weekend and just now noticed this issue. After, switching to "Legacy" and back, I can't recreate the half-cutoff row.
Showing as much of column row 112 as possible - no matter what I do
I have had the issue described above happen again - in editor Table columns - last column line is cutoff. In this instance I was updating the Table in the app by switching to a different datasource. Also not that it is again a table with a large number of columns.
Again, switching to "Legacy" and back helps - line is readable but is still partially cutoff.
There is a bug in the re-sizing of the Editor window in the "New" version that leads to, at times, a row of data being cutoff and un-readable. EDITED: I have should pointed out the reason for posting this issue is because once the New-to-Legacy toggle button is removed, I don't see a way to resolve the problem. It doesn't go away on a re-load. Maybe logout-login?
Below shows bottom of editor window - cannot scroll or resize to get the last column line to appear normally
Comparing "Legacy" Editor columns view to "New" Editor...
Example in "Legacy" Editor
Example of same table in "New" Editor
Hello!
The proposed improvements significantly increase productivity! Thank you!
There are several suggestions:
1. Filter values are not saved when switching between views (they were saved in the old version):
2. Add search for dropdown lists:
2.1 Data ==>> Columns (type Ref) ==>> Source table
2.2. Views ==>> View == >> For this data
3. Add search line Expressions (Data Explorer):
4. In the "Views" section, the sorting of the list with tables (Data ) is different from other sections (for example, "Actions"):
View:
Actions:
5. An error occurred in the application when renaming the "Actions" entity.
The "Actions" entity is related to other entities by name, not by key. When changing the name of the "Action", you have to go into all the entities that are associated with it and select the "Action" with the new name.
6. Add ability to insert column name with [_THISROW] prefix
Need to do:
Current:
This action is required in almost every second expression
I wonder if this issue has been mentioned:
If the window is too small, one can't see all of the icons.
Encountered 2 errors:
1. When entering information in the "Expression Assistant" window, instead of this field, it "jumps" to the search string (if it is not empty):
2. Closing the dropdown list 2-3 seconds after opening (2-3 times close, borrow can normally select the value):
To fix the error, switching to the Legacy Editor and back helps. What time works normally, but then appears again
In continuation of the topic:
1. Bot => Processes => Run a Task => Call Apps Script => Return Value => Object
When adding a new key to an object (returned by Apps Script), the working window closes and transfers to another process
2. The search box "runs over" the elements located below:
3. Expression Assistant => Data Explorer
Pinned tabs are not saved when exiting the editor:
How can we actually reorder the actios?
There is action button, to reorder the actions where they are going to be displayed. However, it seems it does not anything for now.
Also, we normally re-order the position for a set of actions which are placed in either Prominent or Primary. For now, we are not sure if or not where each listed action are placed, either primary, prominently, or inline or dispay. Anyway, at this moment, we are not able to reorder the action positoin under new UX. The only available remedy is to switch back to legacy UX.
Currenlty the actions are grouped by table, but they should be sub grouped by its location inside this navigation bar.
FYI, for me that button brings up a modal dialog where I can indeed reorder actions. Maybe there's an issue in your browser?
I noticed this as well and discovered that the actual order of the position of the buttons is coming from the Slice that was associated with the view I was using.
Is your view using a slice as well @Koichi_Tsuji
A minor request for convenience. Could we have the "open in tab" button, from the top-right of the emulator panel, available even when the emulator panel is collapsed?
Hello @Arthur_Rallu
How can i make my UI same as the improved editor with the grouped features on the left?
1st image is my view using my own email (as member of team) and the improve editor shows normally
However, when i use our admin account, only the menu changed. its like a mix of legacy and improved editor
We are still rolling out this feature to our paid accounts as we fix and improve things, so some of those accounts do not have the new navigation yet.