Announcing: AI-assisted app creation with Gemini in AppSheet!

[goannsplain]

You heard it first at Next ‘24! We’re coming out with our in-product AI-assisted app creation with Gemini in AppSheet. Today, we are excited to share with you, our AppSheet community, that the rollout has begun!

What is it?

Using Gemini in AppSheet, Creators can get a jump on building apps and it’s a great tool for helping new AppSheet users get started creating their first app. 

 AI-assisted app creation takes an idea and turns it into an AppSheet solution. Just describe a business process in natural language, like “I manage a mailroom and I need to keep track of incoming packages and send notifications for people to pick them up” or “I want to be able to keep track of all sales from my homemade cookies.”  You’ll get back a suggested data schema with tables and columns. From there, we'll create a working app for you, complete with basic views and actions.

Last year, we launched Gemini in AppSheet as a Chat app for Google Workspace customers.  This year, we’re embedding the experience right inside the AppSheet surface so you won’t need Google Chat and licensed AppSheet creators will be able to use it, too.

You’ll find Gemini in AppSheet from the Create menu on your My Apps page in AppSheet.com under Create > App > Start with Gemini. Learn more about creating apps using Gemini in AppSheet.

When will it be available?

Some of you already have it!  AI-assisted app creation will be available to accounts with paid AppSheet licenses, including those with AppSheet Core entitlements through their Workspace licenses. But this feature is being released in waves. The rollout started last week and will continue over the next few months as controls are made available for AppSheet admins to manage the use of Gemini in AppSheet.  This means that you may not see the feature until the entire rollout is complete.

We’re happy we can share Gemini in AppSheet with more of the AppSheet community and can’t wait to see what you build with it!

-The Google AppSheet Team

[takuya_miyai]

Hi @goannsplain 

To begin with, since ASDB is specified as the data source by default in Gemini in AppSheet, the ID row may be almost unnecessary.
I would prefer that an app be created that simply specifies the Row ID as the Key.

On top of that, if we want to set something other than Row ID as Key, it would be nice to be able to specify it at the prompt.

[aneeshatgoogle]

We will have a change coming soon that will set RowID as the key by default.

[aneeshatgoogle]

Gemini in AppSheet has a few guardrails built in to avoid getting new users falling into pitfalls as they build on appsheet. One of those guardrails is having a random unique id as key.

Regarding the slice suggestion, were you not able to get the suggestion "the task owner is the user's own email" even after typing? I remember seeing a suggestion for this use case but I will double check.

[takuya_miyai]

@aneeshatgoogle 

I have yet to be able to create a Slice in Gemini in AppSheet.
Does the current Gemini in AppSheet support Slice creation?

@goannsplain 

[Steve]

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@aneeshatgoogle wrote:

One of those guardrails is having a random unique id as key.

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There are very legitimate reasons to not use a random unique ID as key. Will there be a way to bypass the "guardrail"?

[aneeshatgoogle]

I assume the legitimate cases for non random unique ID are things like Employee ID etc. In those cases, you can set that id column as key and remove the AppFormula once the app is created.

[takuya_miyai]

@aneeshatgoogle 

Yes, there are many cases where the employee ID is specified as the Key.
However, I more often specify Email as the Key in the AppSheet user table.

> In those cases, you can set that id column as key and remove the AppFormula once the app is created.

I know I can work around it this way, but I want to make sure I understand how the user who does it every time feels about it.

They probably feel “Gemini can't even understand a simple request to specify Email as a Key?🤔"

[takuya_miyai]

Hi @goannsplain @aneeshatgoogle 

The global default folder path setting is not used for apps created in Gemini.

Apps will be created under the /appsheet/data folder no matter what the default folder path setting in My Account is set to.

 

 

[takuya_miyai]

Hi @goannsplain @aneeshatgoogle 

I would like to see the Relationship menu content displayed during the preview phase.
It would give a visual overview of the application and increase the use of Gemini in AppSheet by citizen developers.

This is my vision for the application.

 

[takuya_miyai]

Hi @goannsplain @aneeshatgoogle 

I have two more request.

I would like to edit the application name for suggested application.

When editing the schema, I want to save it all at once instead of saving it in detail.
With the current UI, I get lots of warnings and noise.