Power Platform Release Notes Broadcaster
Monitors the official Microsoft Power Platform RSS feed for new release notes, feature announcements, and deprecation notices. When a new item is published, posts a formatted summary to the COE Teams channel and sends an Outlook digest to the maker community distribution list to keep everyone current on platform changes.
Provided as-is, without warranty of any kind. Review and test each pattern in a non-production environment before deploying it to live automations. See our Terms.
Overview
The Power Platform Release Notes Broadcaster is a beginner-level cloud flow that monitors the official Microsoft Power Platform RSS feed for new release notes, feature announcements, and deprecation notices. When a new feed item is published, the flow posts a formatted summary to a designated Microsoft Teams channel and sends an Outlook email digest to a maker community distribution list.
This flow is deployed as a solution-aware component inside the FlowLibsPPReleaseNotesBroadcaster Dataverse solution, using environment variables for all configurable references.
Use Case
Power Platform Centers of Excellence (COE) and IT Admin teams need a reliable way to stay on top of platform changes without manually checking blogs or RSS feeds. This flow automates that awareness loop — every new release note or deprecation notice gets surfaced to both a Teams channel (for real-time visibility) and an email distribution list (for async consumption).
The flow is ideal for teams that:
- IT Admins
- All Business Users
- Maker Communities
Flow Architecture
When a feed item is published
RSS - ListFeedItems (trigger)Monitors the URL stored in the flowlibs_PPReleaseNotesFeedUrl environment variable for new RSS feed items.
Initialize varTeamsGroupId
Initialize variableHydrates the Teams Group ID from the flowlibs_TeamsGroupId env var into a flow variable. Runs in parallel with steps 2 and 3.
Initialize varTeamsChannelId
Initialize variableHydrates the Teams Channel ID from the flowlibs_TeamsChannelId env var into a flow variable. Runs in parallel with steps 1 and 3.
Initialize varRecipientEmail
Initialize variableHydrates the recipient email address from the flowlibs_MakerCommunityEmail env var into a flow variable. Runs in parallel with steps 1 and 2.
Post Release Note to Teams Channel
Microsoft Teams - PostMessageToConversationPosts an HTML-formatted message with the feed item title, summary, and link to the configured Teams channel.
Send Digest Email to Maker Community
Office 365 Outlook - SendEmailV2Sends an HTML email with the release note details to the configured maker community distribution list.
Environment Variables
| Schema name | Type | Default | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| flowlibs_PPReleaseNotesFeedUrl | String | https://powerapps.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/feed/ | RSS feed URL to monitor for new Power Platform release notes. |
| flowlibs_TeamsGroupId | String | <configure> | Microsoft 365 Group ID for the target Teams team. Set per environment. |
| flowlibs_TeamsChannelId | String | <configure> | Channel ID within the Teams team. Set per environment. |
| flowlibs_MakerCommunityEmail | String | makers@yourcompany.com | Distribution list or mailbox address that receives the email digests. |
Connectors & Connections
| Connector | API name | Actions used |
|---|---|---|
| RSS | shared_rss | ListFeedItems (trigger) |
| Microsoft Teams | shared_teams | PostMessageToConversation |
| Office 365 Outlook | shared_office365 | SendEmailV2 |
Note — All connections are referenced as solution connection references; the flow is portable between environments as long as a connection is mapped at import time.
Customization Guide
Almost every realistic variant of this flow can be implemented by changing environment variable values. A few cases require small edits inside the flow definition — those are called out explicitly below.
- Set Environment Variable Values
- Navigate to the solution in make.powerautomate.com → Environment Variables. Provide current values for the Teams Group ID, Channel ID, and recipient email for your environment.
- Turn On the Flow
- The flow deploys in a Stopped state. After configuring env vars, edit the flow and click 'Turn on.'
- Change the RSS Feed
- Update flowlibs_PPReleaseNotesFeedUrl to any valid RSS/Atom feed URL to monitor a different source.
- Modify the Teams Message Format
- Edit the 'Post Release Note to Teams Channel' action to adjust the HTML body template.
- Modify the Email Format
- Edit the 'Send Digest Email to Maker Community' action to adjust the subject line or HTML body.
Key Expressions
The flow is intentionally light on Power Fx / WDL gymnastics — the heaviest expressions are the branch-name concatenation and the approval outcome check. They are listed below in the order they appear in the flow.
EXPR.01Teams message body (HTML)
HTML payload posted to the Teams channel; renders the feed item's title, summary, and primary link.
EXPR.02Email subject
Outlook email subject line — prefixes the RSS feed item title with a fixed label.
EXPR.03Email body (HTML)
HTML body sent to the maker community distribution list; mirrors the Teams post with a footer attribution.
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