Published Release Notes

Pulse configurations in the case type settings

In both App Studio and Dev Studio you can now configure Pulse in a simplified and user-friendly way, in the case type settings. Add Pulse posts to cases, define default and add new feed sources, and then customize the Pulse label, all without performing advanced actions, such as configuring sections. You can also define visibility conditions for each post type.

For more information, see Start collaborating faster with simplified Pulse configuration (8.4), Configuring Pulse for case types in Dev Studio, Configuring Pulse for case types in App Studio.

Extended language support in text analytics

Pega Platform™ text analytics now supports 9 more languages. You can build entity and topic detection models to analyze text in the Japanese, Russian, Turkish, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, Polish, Croatian, and Czech languages. In addition, Pega Platform now includes a default small talk detection model for each of these languages.

For more information, see Language support for NLP and Out-of-the-box text analytics models.

Historical data extraction for adaptive models

Adaptive models now support the extraction of historical customer responses for offline analysis. Additionally, you can use the historical data to build a model in a machine learning service of your choice.

For more information, see Extract historical responses from adaptive models for offline analysis (8.4).

Simulation of data pages and third-party connections

When configuring your unit test case environment, you can now set up simulated data for connector and data page rules, instead of connecting to external sources.

By simulating such data calls, you are not dependent on any third-party server when running your tests.

This feature supports the following rules:

• Data page
• Connect-Cassandra
• Connect-CMIS
• Connect-dotNet
• Connect-EJB
• Connect-HBase
• Connect-HTTP
• Connect-Java
• Connect-JMS
• Connect-MQ
• Connect-REST
• Connect-SAP
• Connect-SAPJCo
• Connect-SOAP

For more information about simulating third-party connections, see Simulating data pages and third-party connections.

New branch quality dashboard

Pega Platform™ 8.4 introduces a new branch quality dashboard that shows the following metrics:

• The branch’s guardrail compliance score and the number of guardrail violations
• The percentage and number of unit tests that passed for the branch
• The percentage and number of rules that the tests cover
• Potential merge conflicts that can be addressed directly from the branch quality dashboard

For more information about the new branch quality dashboard, see Viewing branch quality and branch contents.

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.

Improved reliability of Visual Business Director

Improvements to the reliability of Visual Business Director (VBD) eliminate the impact of temporary access loss to the VBD cluster. The improvements include the ability to continue writing data to a VBD dataset while the corresponding server node is unavailable, enhancements to single-case data flows that write data to VBD, and a reduction in the VBD cache size.

For more information, see Eliminate the impact of temporary access loss to the VBD cluster (8.4).

Support for the Unified Messaging channel

You can now create a Unified Messaging channel so that users can interact with a Pega Platform™ application by chatting in Pega Intelligent Virtual Assistant™ (IVA), for example, through Apple Business Chat, Facebook Messenger, Twitter, or a web chat window. The Unified Messaging channel is quick to develop and uses an integrated customer service platform to provide a completely new user experience. You can optionally also integrate a Unified Messaging channel with the Pega Unified Messaging Desktop™ customer service agent solution.

For more information, see Develop an IVA channel to chat across multiple social messaging platforms, Unified Messaging channel overview, and Creating a Unified Messaging channel.

Unified Messaging Desktop integration with Pega Platform

You can now use the Pega Unified Messaging Desktop™ customer service solution with a Pega Platform™ application so that customer service representatives (CSRs) and other users, such as managers, can respond to user requests more quickly and in a more consistent manner. With integrated Pega Unified Messaging Desktop, CSRs can escalate user requests from Pega Intelligent Virtual Assistants™ (IVAs) by using case processing and artificial intelligence alongside Pega Customer Service™

For more information, see Develop a single IVA channel to chat across different messaging platforms.

Strategies are now available as a condition type in proposition filters

When designing proposition filters, you can now include strategy outcomes as a condition to be evaluated. Select a strategy and specify the component that you want to use as output to include more advanced decisioning in your proposition filters.

For more information, see Enrich your Proposition Filter rules with conditions based on strategy results.