Published Release Notes

Guardrail warnings for UI components

Pega Platform™ now displays guardrail warnings about user interface elements that might be high maintenance. With this enhancement, you can ensure that your application meets the latest development requirements for efficiency and ease of use, and save time during future upgrades.

For more information, see Reviewing UI components.

Improved contracts for implementations

For more complete contracts, automations now support embedded pages, default values, and picklists. These enhancements provide a more robust model for inputs and outputs that is easier to update and maintain.

For more information, see Viewing automations.

Enhanced OpenAPI Specification generation

To better understand the purpose of your REST API, you can now generate a more complete OpenAPI Specification (OAS) from REST service rules in Pega Platform™. The system uses relevant records to build an accurate schema definition for page and page list outputs, and generate stronger schema type definitions for all inputs, outputs, and fields, such as array or boolean. You can also generate OAS by mapping values to JSON or Clipboard in the request, or mapping values from JSON or Clipboard in the response. 

For more information, see Service REST rules.

Hierarchical table overhaul

The hierarchical table layout now uses a redesigned architecture that enhances stability and presentation. This update also improves accessibility by implementing ARIA guidelines and introducing keyboard navigation in tables.

For more information, see Creating a hierarchical table layout.

Default support for skip links

All Pega Platform™ access groups now support skip links by default. Before, you had to create special access groups for users who require skip links for screen readers. Now, the feature is automatically enabled for every group, which improves the user experience and simplifies development.

Enhancements to automations for defining Pega API contracts

With enhanced automations, you can now pass embedded pages, specify default values for optional input parameters, and define a set of values for inputs by using the picklist or enumerated field types. The new enhancements make your applications easier to define and maintain, and you can now provide callers of Pega APIs with a clear description of the API.

For more information, see Viewing automations.

Personalized views in table layouts

Table layouts now provide users with the option to save preferred run-time configurations, such as column visibility and filtering, as permanent profiles. This enhancement helps users create dedicated views for specific work scenarios, which reduces the need for repetitive adjustments to the user interface and improves productivity.

For more information, see Enabling table personalization.

Upgrade impact

After an upgrade to 8.4 and later, the default table toolbar styling and experience may be unexpectedly different for any customized tables in a client's application: if you enabled a tool bar action for a personalizable table and the 8.4 application overrides your customization, your application now displays the default 8.4 table toolbar.

What steps are required to update the application to be compatible with this change?

Existing clients that upgrade to Pega Platform 8.4 and later may need to update applications in some scenarios. Any custom actions present in the overridden section may need to be re-authored into this toolbar using the additional actions section.

Autopopulated properties support savable data pages

To more easily source data, you can now save an autopopulated property that references a savable data page. For properties that you autopopulate by copy, save plans now execute on the copy, instead of on the data page. These enhancements reduce implementation time and make the applications that you build more manageable.

Updated default dynamic system setting for requestor pools

Clients can now enable or disable requestor pools for processing service requests using a new dynamic system setting called EnableRequestorPools with Pega-IntegrationEngine as the owning rulest. Previously, all deployments utilized requestor pools to improve service processing response efficiency; requestor pools eliminated overhead by automatically returning a requestor to the pool after it fulfills a service request. Starting in Pega Platform 8.4, requestor pools are disabled in Client-managed cloud deployments, since these deployments use autoscaling to handle service request traffic. Enabling requestor pools in Kubernetes environments is not recommended, because they can inhibit the default autoscaling settings in the environment.

Requestor pools remain enabled by default in Pega Cloud and on-premises environments.

To help clients navigate this change, Pega has updated its best practice guidance for configuring requestor pools. For an overview, see Requestor pooling for services. For guidance on the use of requestor pools in your application, see the EnableRequestorPools entry in Dynamic system settings data instances.

Upgrade impact

Requestor pools are disabled by default in Pega Platform 8.4 in client-managed cloud deployments. Clients who deployed previous versions of Pega Platform on a Kubernetes environment and who upgrade to Pega Platform 8.4 could see that their services behave differently.

What steps are required to update the application to be compatible with this change?

If clients that are deployed in a Client-managed cloud environment need to configure their services to use requestor pools and they understand how to configure requestor pools for their optimized use, these clients can re-enable requestor pools. Clients should review the best practice for configuring requestor pools before they re-enable requestor pools. To re-enable requestor pools, you modify the EnableRequestorPools setting in the Pega-IntegrationEngine Owning ruleset from “disabled” to Enabled [no value]. For details, see Editing a dynamic system setting.

Support for sending emails by using Microsoft Graph

Email integration with Microsoft Office 365 now supports sending emails by using Microsoft Graph. With this enhancement, you can send email with a more secure protocol that complies with your organization’s security policy.

For more information, see Creating an email account.