TECH MONDAY: How do you make Dataverse data available in an SPA hosted on Power Pages?
Power Pages It can serve as a backend for an SPA that makes Dataverse data available to users without licenses. This approach requires you to develop the frontend yourself, secure the interface, and plan deployments across environments.
Data from Dataverse can be made available to users without licenses through a single-page application hosted at Power Pages. The front end is then built from scratch, while Power Pages provides hosting, data access, and server-side functionality.
This is an alternative to a traditional portal based on pre-built templates and the Liquid and jQuery frameworks. It allows you to choose a front-end framework, but it also increases the scope of responsibility for the team developing the application.
As of the publication of this article, Power Pages did not support applications built using Blazor and WebAssembly.
Power Pages as a backend for SPA applications
In the traditional approach, the platform provides tools and templates for creating a portal. In the SPA model, the Power Pages services are primarily used to host the application and manage its backend.
The front end can be developed using any supported framework of your choice. However, you must design all of its elements, functionality, and appearance yourself.
This allows you to integrate your own interface with Power Platform services without using Azure or any other cloud platform or hosting service.
Frontend built from scratch
The lack of ready-made templates means that the team is responsible for creating every element of the interface and the entire styling system.
Microsoft recommends using artificial intelligence to assist with this process. It also provides dedicated skill sets— Power Pages —for GitHub Copilot and Claude AI.
This approach requires more effort on the front-end side than building a traditional portal like Power Pages.
Authentication of External Users
Integration with an identity provider must be set up as part of the application. The available documentation and guidelines describe the use of Microsoft Entra or Entra External ID in this context.
According to the author of the article, these solutions should serve as the default identity repositories for external users by 2026.
Server-side and interface-side authorization
Web Roles provide server-side access control. This mechanism is made possible by using Power Pages as the application's backend.
Securing the front end remains a separate task. For example, the application developer is responsible for hiding features that a given user should not have access to.
Access control therefore consists of two layers:
- server-side security measures,
- Interface behavior that depends on the user's permissions.
Secure Access to Dataverse Records
Power Pages The API provides the application with selected datasets stored in Dataverse. You can specify which records should be available and who can access them.
In this regard, the SPA application uses the same security model as traditional websites ( Power Pages). The backend controls access to data regardless of the security measures implemented in the interface itself.
Business Logic at Power Automate or Power Pages
You can implement your own processes and services using cloud flows ( Power Automate ) or the server-side logic mechanism ( Power Pages).
This allows you to keep the application's backend in the Power Platform and use its services to manage data and business processes.
Deploying SPA applications across environments
The site configuration can be migrated using Dataverse solutions. However, this method does not include the built SPA front end.
Moving an application therefore requires two steps:
- transferring the website configuration,
- re-deploy the frontend using the PAC CLI tools.
This limitation should be taken into account when planning the release process for future versions of the application.
When is this model applicable?
This option is worth considering when the backend of a modern application is to run on the Power Platform, and the organization does not want to use Azure or an external hosting service.
If it is possible to build an application outside of the Power Platform, you should also consider the Power Pages pricing model. In that case, external hosting may be a better and more cost-effective solution.
The final choice depends on where the backend is hosted, how the frontend is managed, and the application deployment process.
Power Pages SPA integrates its own front end with Dataverse services, but requires you to secure the interface yourself and deploy subsequent versions separately.
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