Published Release Notes

Menu enhancements in the Facebook and WebChat user conversational channels

When you create a Facebook or WebChat channel interface to act as a Pega^® Intelligent Virtual Assistant, you can use a Facebook-like generic template to display a rich user interface menu. You must use a data transform for the custom response to display this menu. You can use and modify the pyPopulateOutboundData data transform for this purpose.

For more information, see Adding custom responses for the Facebook channel and Adding custom responses for the WebChat channel.

Quicker approach for reusing processes in a stage

You can now reuse processes more quickly in a stage when you define the life cycle for a case type. Reusing processes saves time and makes it easier to define processes for a stage instead of creating new ones. You can also reuse processes faster when you add parallel processes to a stage.

For more information, see Quick access for reusing processes in a stage.

Improved user management for new applications

You can now invite users to join your team when you run the New Application wizard. By managing user credentials and roles during application setup, you can start development immediately.

For more information, see Creating an application.

New application document types capture features and user stories

Pega® Platform adds two new application document types based on features and stories:

• Use product overview documents to socialize the application development plan and progress.
• Use gap analysis documents to identify the gaps between the application and your needs to clarify which customizations to build.

For more information, see Real-time agile application document types.

Customized application overview documents in App Studio

Keep stakeholders notified of the status of an application by customizing and generating an application overview document in App Studio. The overview may include information such as case types, roles, features in your application, and more. Select the chapters that you want to include in the overview, and then highlight the most relevant information by ordering the chapters. In addition to the application overview document, you can generate a detailed data model, either in Microsoft Word or Excel format.

For more information, see Creating project documents for stakeholders in App Studio, Exporting a data model into a document.

New send email automations and enhancements

You can now configure cases, flows, and activities to compose and send guardrail-compliant emails that conform to the MIME standard by using email automations. Use the new Call-Automation method to call an automation from an activity without writing Java.

You can also now categorize error messages in automations to quickly understand the type of error that occurred. In addition, page list data types are now supported for inputs and outputs in automations.

For more information, see Calling an automation from an activity and Viewing automations.

More efficient navigation between applications in App Studio

The new My Applications gadget helps you switch applications in App Studio more conveniently. You can also search applications by name instead of choosing an application from the list, and then select the access role that you want to use. In addition, you can see descriptions of your applications and create an application by going to the My Applications landing page. To use the My Applications gadget, ensure that you update the UI Kit to version 14.

For more information, see Adding the My Applications gadget, Switching between applications in App Studio.

Facilitated application development with saving changes in branches in App Studio

For improved development of your application, you can now define branches in which you save changes that you make to your application in App Studio. Create features in branches so that you can review and merge them without affecting other features in the application. You can quickly identify and review any changes to rules because you know in which application layer they were saved. 

For more information, see Setting branch preferences in Dev Studio, Setting branch preferences in App Studio.

Support for controlling simulations in Integration Designer

Integration Designer now supports toggling an existing simulation for a data source on and off, and supports creating a simulation when a data source does not have a simulation configured. By simulating a data source, you can continue developing an application when your integration is not available, and test an application independently from the integration.

For more information, see Managing data and integrations with the Integration Designer.