Published Release Notes

Support for filtering requests and responses in activity-based REST services

You can now use a JSON data transform to filter inputs and outputs in activity-based REST services. With this enhancement, you maintain high performance by filtering unnecessary properties from the REST service request and response.

For more information, see Creating a request for POST, PUT, and PATCH methods by using an activity implementation and Creating a response for Service REST methods by using an activity implementation.

Tracer file size limit to prevent disk usage issues

The maximum size of files with event details that Tracer generates is now 10 GB to avoid excessive disk usage and performance issues. Tracer applies the size limit at the node-level, so every node that runs in your system can use up to 10 GB of disk space to create an output file with event details. As a result, you can monitor the health of your system and deliver issue-free applications without experiencing disk space problems.

For more information, see:

• Avoid performance issues when monitoring applications with size limit for Tracer files (8.6)
• Tracer disk usage FAQ

Support for configuring data sources by using OpenAPI Specification

The Integration Designer in App Studio now supports OpenAPI Specification. You can provide an OpenAPI Specification endpoint or upload a YAML file to automatically generate data sources according to the specification. With this enhancement, you avoid having to manually create a representative sample JSON request and response, saving you time and increasing productivity.

For more information, see Integrating with a REST API by using OpenAPI Specification.

Integration and security tab now divided into two tabs

The Integration and Security tab is now two separate tabs on the Application Definition form: Integration and Security. While the content of these two tabs are related, they function more effectively as separate tabs. The Security tab now includes the Authentication section, so you can add existing authentication services to your Application Definition to more effectively manage the security of your application. 

For more information, see Security tab of the Application Definition.

Nested conditions visible in the condition builder

Condition builder now supports the option to view nested conditions in a read-only mode, so that you can conveniently analyze and understand logic in your application. For example, if you create a condition that uses another When condition rule as a value to compare at run time, you can preview the configuration of that When condition. You can use this feature with When conditions nested at multiple levels, so that you can analyze even complex logic in your application.

For more information, see Defining conditions in the condition builder.

More detailed configuration of persona access in App Studio

App Studio now supports more precise configuration of access for personas so that you can improve the security and usability of your application. You can now define what actions a given persona can perform on a case, a data object, or a configuration set. You also save time because you define settings for an entire group of users that a persona represents. For example, you can configure a customer service representative (CSR) persona to view only cases that process insurance claims from VIP customers, without the option to modify the cases. As a result, you ensure that users of your application can interact only with relevant data, in a way that best meets your business needs.

For more information, see:

• Manage access for personas more efficiently in App Studio (8.6)
• Configuring access options for a persona

Improved security after hiding SQL values

In Pega Platform™ version 8.6, the default value of the showSQLInList dynamic system setting changes to FALSE, which suppresses the visibility of the SQL values in the Clipboard tool. With this setting disabled, when you run a report definition the clipboard does not display sensitive values in the pxSQLStatementPre and pxSQLStatementPost properties, which makes your system less vulnerable. If you want to display the values, in the .prconfig file, set the prconfig/security/showSQLInListPage/default to TRUE.

Questionnaires available in App Studio

App Studio now supports authoring questionnaires, which in previous releases of Pega Platform™ were known as surveys. You can create questionnaires, add question pages, and populate the pages with questions of different types so that you can collect the exact data that your business processes require. For more efficient data management and reuse, data objects from a data model now store answers to questions, instead of autogenerated properties. For example, when a customer provides a date of birth in a questionnaire, and your application stores the date as a data object, you can conveniently reuse that data object in related cases. For greater flexibility, both standard Pega Platform and Cosmos React applications support questionnaires, however, some question types are unavailable in Cosmos React.

For more information, see:

• Create questionnaires in a low-code way in App Studio (8.6)
• Creating a questionnaire

Improved resiliency and observability of email infrastructure

Pega Platform now has several enhancements to improve the resiliency and observability of its email infrastructure. With the following enhancements, you can improve service quality and reduce maintenance costs:

• Pega Predictive Diagnostic Cloud alerts notify you of connection timeouts and help you troubleshoot more quickly.
• Default values for email settings ensure that your email configuration is optimal and follows best practices.
• Email listeners automatically retry test connectivity upon start-up if the connection fails or authentication fails.
• Improved logging provides meaningful messages and log categorization to support debugging.

For more information, see List of events and notifications in PDC.

Improved support of browser actions in Cosmos React UI

Pega Platform™ applications that use the Cosmos React now maintain user settings for the duration of the session. For example, if a user applies filters and sorting to a table, and then opens a new document, the application retains the table settings when the user navigates back to the page by clicking the browser back button.

This change improves user productivity by reducing the need to repeatedly apply the same settings.