I just dropped a new YouTube video, and if you liked the last "3 Hacks" videos, you'll like this one too!

It covers the 3 hacks that saved me the most time over the past few years of building Power Apps. And when I say "time" I mean hours.

Here's a quick rundown.

Hack 1: Let AI Edit Your YAML

Everything in Power Apps is YAML under the hood. You can right click any control, copy the code, and paste it somewhere. Most people know this. But most people stop there.

Here's where it gets interesting: paste that YAML into Claude (or any good AI model), and ask it to change all your accent colors from blue to red. Or rename every control to follow a proper naming convention. Or add padding to every container.

In the video, I took a full app from PowerLibs (360+ lines of YAML), gave it to Claude with a one sentence prompt, and got back a perfectly recolored version. Pasted it back in and it worked immediately.

A year ago, you had to write detailed prompts explaining every little thing. Now the AI just gets it. That shift is real.

One thing to watch for: always give the result a quick visual check. About 5% of the time, the AI adds a property that doesn't exist in Power Apps or slightly tweaks the structure. But 95% of the time, it just works.

Hack 2: Containers for Responsive Layouts

Most Power Apps look fine on the screen they were built on. Then someone opens them on a tablet or phone, and everything overlaps.

The reason: absolute positioning. Drag a button to x=200, y=300, and that's where it stays forever, regardless of screen size.

Power Apps actually has a layout system that works like web development. Containers with horizontal or vertical direction, fill vs. fixed sizing, and a Wrap property that automatically stacks elements when the screen gets too narrow.

The real trick is using App.ActiveScreen.Size (which returns 1 through 4 depending on screen width) to show or hide components. In the video, I built an app shell where the sidebar disappears on small screens and a bottom navigation bar appears instead. All with a one line visibility formula: AppShell.Size >= 3.

Quick tips: always set a layout gap on your containers for consistent spacing. Use fill portions for flexible columns (same value = 50/50, different values = fractions). And nest your containers: horizontal for rows, vertical inside those for columns.

Hack 3: App Formulas for Icon Management

Power Apps has built in icons, but they're pretty limited. So most people find SVGs online, encode them, paste them into image controls. Then repeat that 20 times across 5 screens.

There's a better way. Power Apps has a Formulas property on the App object (not the OnStart property). You can define a named formula like MyIcons that holds all your SVG data in one place. Then reference MyIcons.Home or MyIcons.Settings anywhere in your app.

Need to swap an icon? Change it once in the formula and it updates everywhere, across every screen.

And here's the bonus: I added a Formula Builder to PowerIcons. You browse the icon library, pick the ones you want, and it generates the complete formula code for you. Copy it, paste it into your Formulas property, and you're good to go.

Why formulas instead of OnStart? Formulas are declarative. They don't block your app from loading. OnStart runs sequentially, so the more stuff you put in there, the slower your app starts. For simple apps you probably won't notice. But as your app grows, formulas is the way to go.

Watch the Full Video

All three hacks are demonstrated step by step in the video with real Power Apps examples. If you want to see this in action (especially the responsive layout part, which is easier to understand visually), check it out on my YouTube channel.

I'm thinking about doing a longer, dedicated video on containers and responsive layouts specifically. If that's something you'd watch, let me know.

Cheers,

Dennis