Question on best method to use when creating a table within a model driven app

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Posted on by CD-28031715-0

I'm trying to reduce the number of spreadsheets that are used by a charity that I'm involved with.

I am new to PowerApps but have got my head around setting up tables, columns, forms and views. I plan to have a Contact table that will be the main place that we store information. However, we have several groups that our Contacts can attend and I'd like to be able to record when someone attends a group and which group they attend, the date and possibly a summary of the support they received too. I'd also like to be able to get reports/charts of the groups attended per week/month/year etc. We have 5 face to face groups each week (each is at a different location), some online 1-2-1 slots on two days of the week and an online group once a week, also a social walk and support once a month. I wouldn't want these all lumped together, but to be able to drill down how many Contacts attend each of the group/sessions each week and also see the Groups that a contact has attended on their Contact record. Help!

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CD-28031715-0 26 on at

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Question on best method to use when creating a table within a model driven app

I have tried to reply previously to individual messages but haven't been able to work out how to do so, so I'll put a global reply here. Thank you for your comprehensive reply Michael, but I'm afraid a lot of it went over my head. I ended up using ChatGPT to get the solution to my problem this time. I have posted another question that I have but it hasn't been approved for publication yet.
Michael E. Gernaey 38,415 Super User 2025 Season 1 on at

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Question on best method to use when creating a table within a model driven app

Hi @CD-28031715-0

Please let us know if the suggestions are good. As people take their time to respond, please respect that and :-) share your responses.
ronaldwalcott 1,988 on at

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Question on best method to use when creating a table within a model driven app

If you have access try using the plan designer Use the Plan designer to create a business solution with Copilot (preview) - Power Apps | Microsoft Learn. This should provide you with insight on your data structure.
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Michael E. Gernaey 38,415 Super User 2025 Season 1 on at

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Question on best method to use when creating a table within a model driven app

Hi #@CD-28031715-0

The starting point would be for you to create a visualization of the data, so that it is easy to understand the relationship between the tables, based on your business needs.

Looking only at what you put. It would start like this

1. Contact Table (The actual users)

2. Group Table (The possible Groups)

2a. Group Type Table

Note: Since you have different types of Groups, you COULD just create a local Group Table Option Set, or create a Global Option Set.

For me... while this is good, I prefer to use a simple Text best mapping table

This table would hold

-Type Id

-Type Namne

-Type Description

Then in your Form, you would have a dropdown or combobox that is full of these string values, in the Group Table, you can either

a) copy the string (making analytics easy)

b) a lookup between 2 and 2b. Meh for me.. I do not like having tons of lookups even though they do help with relationship management

3. Attendance (The Details about the Groups a person was in)

This is essentially a mapping table between the other 2 tables

You can have the following for instance

-Contact Id (LookUp)

-Group Id (LookUp)

-(possible) Schedule Id (lookup)

-Date of Attendance (And / Or)

--You could intentionally break down Date into

Week (Int)

Month (Int)

Year (Int)

The benefit to breaking it down, and not just having the data, but it makes SUMing and create calculations etc even in Power BI easier.

4. Schedule

Not sure if you need a sched, but if the same group can happen more than once, then you need to map a Group + Schedule with the Attendance

Now that all being said, this is a very Data driven activity and something that really should go to a Consultant.

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