Akumina and SPFx - akumina/AkuminaTraining GitHub Wiki

We have titled this page Akumina AND the SPFx because we don't want you to think that Akumina is competing with the SPFx framework, that is just not the case.

Microsoft and what they have created with the SPFx framework is a vital piece of the development / deployment process for working with and creating new 'Client Side Add-Ins' for use on Modern and soon be Classic pages within Sharepoint. Their framework serves their purpose well and meets the goals of THEIR audience / customer base. We would argue it is meant for a different developer 'persona', one that is more intimate with the inter-workings of Sharepoint. The Akumina Framework is all about catering to different 'personas' and I think as you learn more it will become more clear. There is nothing restricting the use of the SPFx framework along side the Akumina Framework( or even deploying Akumina Widgets / or the Akumina Framework itself ) and because the Akumina framework actually initialize AFTER the Sharepoint page load the tooling and functionality of your Akumina Implementation can take advantage of it. The SPFx is all about DEVELOPMENT process PRE-IMPLEMENTATION, creating an interface for manipulating 'Client Side Add-In' properties and getting your code deployed for consumption. The Akumina framework is a series of tools that help a customer customize their implementation both BEFORE and AFTER the code is deployed. Think, changing HTML markup, or changing which 'view' a 'widget' will use.

There are also other advantages to using the Akumina Framework ontop of Sharepoint, with or without the use of SPFx. Akumina has also decided to provide a development path and a series of technology choices for quick and easy rollout of functionality. The SPFx leaves this completely open, and can be overwhelming for a 'persona' outside the advanced Sharepoint Developer.

In short, The Akumina DWP framework is built on top of the Sharepoint page that uses an HTML snippet for loading its 'Widgets', a javascript Callback (to change Business Logic), and an HTML template (for presentation). This is very easy for most developers to understand, not just Sharepoint developers.

Here is a short list of advantages that the Akumina Framework provides NOT found within SPFx natively.

  • A widget framework (Design Pattern, Widget Instances, Widget Views) for quickly rebuilding and reusing widgets
  • 16 Pre-built 'widgets'
  • 2 'generic' listing and display widgets for quick retrieval and presentation of Sharepoint data without every writing a line of JSOM, or REST code
  • A Page Lifecycle, for injection custom steps or executing code before during and after page load
  • An advanced 'UserContext' - this provides quick access at the current user and provides for advanced functionality like Audience Targetting
  • Caching Layer – an out of the box caching layer utilizing lscache which allows for caching sharepoint data in local storage which limits the amount of re-querying that happens
  • A data presentation/view framework built on top of Handlebars– this provides a tokenization like experience to present Sharepoint data with HTML markup
  • Widget/Control property editing WITHOUT editing the page - with SPFx if you want to add a new 'Add-In' to a page or change its properties you have to edit the entire PAGE.
  • Out of the box Graph integration with easy access to the Graph APIs
  • A dashboard framework for allowing your widget to be dragged or dropped to a user specific view without creating a page for each user
  • View Manager – allows business users to easily edit presentation views without writing a line of javascript or calling a developer
  • A Site Deployment framework – for easily deploying assets such as Master Pages,Pages,Lists,Page Content and code to a Sharepoint site collection