What's new in Pega 7.2

User interface

• Skin inheritance allows you to create a base skin from which subsequent dependent skins can inherit styles and mixins. A skin can support any number of nested skins. The skin rule form now includes an Inheritance tab where inherited formats can be included or overridden.

• Repeating Dynamic Layouts display large non-tabular paginated lists without incurring the cost of loading it all onto the browser. Pagination is configured in the cell properties of the repeating dynamic layout.

• All components that display headers include a configurable heading level. The heading generates semantic markup and makes the user interface accessible to assistive technologies. The skin includes a Base settings tab to provide heading level styling. Existing container formats are backward compatible.

• You can open a rule properties tab by using Live UI and enable run-time editing by using a Enable live editing link, which creates a run-time branch of the application rule.

• You can configure the Date control to show only past dates, only future dates, or any date range that includes the current year.

• Accessibility improvements include assistive technology announcements for wait indicator status, overlays, and layouts. Improved keyboard navigation provides the ability to dismiss overlays by pressing the Esc key and to expand and collapse layouts by pressing the Tab key.

• Create simple case types that you can gradually extend with a data model, stages, processes, and steps.

• Reuse flows and user actions in a process to save time.

• Use assignments and smart shapes in Case Designer to quickly build processes.

• Implement single or cascading approval techniques to enforce your business policies.

• Create and associate specifications with steps and user forms when you design a case in Case Designer.

• Add validation to fields on a form to define the expected value for user input.

• Calculate the value of a field by referencing numeric fields in repeating field groups.

• Customize Pulse or build your own gadget to collaborate with your team, add tags to posts, and reference other users.

• Configure team settings for case routing and approval, and define user profiles for your team.

• Delegate correspondences, map values, and circumstanced versions of supported items that you can delegate.

• Define relevant records, which are a collection of properties, flows, flow actions, or sections, that are most likely to be reused for a case or data type, to your contextual class.

• You can now create and associate specifications with steps and user forms when you design a case in Case Designer.
• Use the new Document Application tool to generate application profile documents, application documents, and specification documents.
• The Document Application tool captures screenshots server-side for application documents, rather than using an Internet Explorer client-side process. During installation or upgrade to Pega 7.2, your system administrator must enable server-side screen capture.
• To address Google Chrome ending support for NPAPI plug-ins, Chrome users will now upload a Word document as a specification description or export a specification description to Word, instead of using the Silverlight plug-in to create or edit a specification description in Word. Non-Chrome users are unaffected.

• Learn about the functionality of the Predictive Analytics Director (PAD) portal.

• Create Proposition Filter rule instances to define the validity, eligibility, and relevancy criteria for a set of strategy results, based on the proposition data and customer properties.

• Create, test, and implement revisions with the customizable, stage-based Revision Management process.

• Convert legacy batch run simulations into data flows and data sets.

• Execute and monitor runs of batch and real time data flows through the DataFlow-Execute method.

• Configure pre- and post-activities for the runs of batch and real-time data flows.

• Configure, train, and analyze text analytics models for sentiment or classification analysis of various types of text units.

• Identify sentiment-bearing terms with the granular, color-coded sentiment analysis in the Free Text Model rule form.

• Configure the advanced settings for language detection, checking spelling, and classification or sentiment analysis in the Free Text Model rule form.

• Perform bulk operations on the Adaptive Models Management landing page and in the Adaptive Model rule.

• Estimate the memory that the Adaptive Decision Manager (ADM) system needs to accommodate the models that use the adaptive model configuration.

• Test decisioning strategies by using the updated Single case and Batch case test runs.

• Launch Visual Business Director (VBD) that is embedded in the Pega 7 Platform. Use the VBD HTML client on the Chrome web browser.

• Browse Interaction History data set by Subject ID or Group ID.

• Configure HBase data set and do the mapping without referencing any connector.

• Use advanced configuration options for the Hadoop host configuration.

• The Offline configuration landing page is now available.

• The contents of the Mobile tab of the Application rule form have been redesigned.

• The Signature Capture control has been enhanced. Post-processing can be performed after entering a signature. You can also apply a signature to a page instead of an attachment. See Adding a Signature Capture control for more details.

• A single offline ready application now supports creation of online-only and offline-ready cases. They are available at all times, even when offline.
• Large reference data is supported in offline apps. A data page can be marked as a large data page and is now supported in list-based components such as repeating dynamic layout, autocomplete, drop-down, and radio button.
• Other improvements:
  • Read-only grids with limited features are supported.
  • Auto-populated properties can be configured.
  • Create work with parameters is available.
  • Open work by handle is also available.
  • Decision shapes with Boolean expressions (no when rules) can be used in screen flows.
  • Barcode scanning is now available in offline mode.

• Use multiple built-on applications to enhance ruleset and framework reuse across applications and to reduce dependencies between applications.

• The Query Schema Tools and Query Inspector landing pages have been added for Pega Cloud customers who use Postgres. The Schema Tools landing page lets you view the tables, columns, indexes, and views in the PegaRULES and PegaDATA database schemas, increase the size of text columns, add and delete indexes, update database statistics for a table, and defragment a table. The Query Inspector landing page lets you enter a SQL query and generate an explain plan.

• Query support has been added for multiple schemas. You can move class tables to any schema in the Pega 7 Platform database, and write Report Definition rules joining tables in those schemas.

• You can create a Report Definition that combines data in multiple class tables using the Report on descendant class instances option in Report Definitions. When you select this option, a new option, Include all descendant classes, is displayed. You can use this option to include the data from all, or any subset of, the descendant classes of the report’s primary class.

• Manage clusters effectively by specializing nodes to run selective agents.

• When you specialize a rule, simplified circumstancing options provide more flexibility.

• Access the contextual Data model tab from your case type to manage the fields that support the case type.
• Use the clean, consistent user interface of Data Designer to quickly create data types.
• Define data types by using a wide range of field types that are categorized as simple, fancy, and complex. Some simple and fancy types such as picklists and attachments require additional configuration.
• The External Data Entities landing page provides a consolidated view of the existing external data entities. You can identify real-time and simulated sources on this landing page.

• Enable API case integration by using the Integration case-type property to generate code that allows you to interact with cases from external applications.
• Allow external client applications to access the Pega API and REST services on your behalf by using the OAuth 2.0 protocol client credentials grant type. Create Client Registration data instances as a part of this process.
• Connect to OAuth 2.0-protected APIs by using the authorization code or client credentials grant type. Create OAuth 2.0 Provider data instances as a part of this process.
• Use the enhanced Authentication Profile rule form to create authentication profiles of type OAuth 2.0.
• Add an Information Mashup section to a layout, a region, another section, or a cell in a layout to connect to external applications and delegate access to OAuth 2.0-protected resources.
• Create SAP integration of type IDoc by uploading an IDoc XSD document. You can update the SAP connector by using the Connect SAP rule form that now supports IDoc connector types.
• Configure the Integration & security tab of your application rule to access, store, and manage versions of case attachments in CMIS repositories.
• Use the enhanced Connect CMIS rule form to define connections with CMIS repositories.
• The Atom Server and SOAP Server rule forms are deprecated. Use the Connect CMIS form instead.

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