Deciding on Pega Constellation SDK vs DX API

User Experience
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1

We have an exisitng application built on Theme-Cosmos. Its is embedded into client webpage using mashup. Huge amount of styling and customizations were done from UI perspective to match the client requirement.

Since Pega is recommending Constellation, very recenlty we have migrated our application to Constellation.

Issues:

  1. Backend cannot be easliy styled to match the customer front facing interface

  2. Have created so many custom components to support the UI and functionalty, and even after that we are not close to match the exsiting theme-cosmos application styling and features in front end (so many conditions added in react web app) or back end(pega web portal)

  3. Number of SRs we need to raise to resolve issues we find when working in Constellation

Due to this, we are reevalauting our options whether,

  1. Should we have stayed on Theme-Cosmos

  2. Stay in Constellation and use DX API (better APIs than traditional), so we have the flexibility of building our UI.

Please provide your opinion.

Thank you!

2

@VENUSHKA

it is not directly said but I assume you refer to the implementation of Web Embed in Constellation. With Web Embed the assumption is that you use the Constellation Design system and OOTB functionalities. This means that if you need some extra functionality you need to implement it via DX Custom component and for the look and feel it uses the Constellation Design system. In the scenario described by you, it looks the client wants to achieve a fully customized UI. For that purpose, it might be worth evaluating Constellation SDKs. SDKs will allow you to create custom UI experiences adjusted to clients’ needs. SDKs will speed up the work. Implementing everything from scratch using raw DX API connectivity is possible but the effort needed is quite substantial.

3

@VENUSHKA

Constellation UI offers several benefits compared to Theme Cosmos application. As you already moved to Constellation, the recommendation to stay with Constellation.

As Kamil mentioned, I would suggest you to think about the below options before moving to DX APIs. The cost would be significant with DX APIs and requires a different team to maintain the code.

  1. Constellation OOTB

  2. Web Embed UI (you can apply Themes to match with look and feel on your web page)

  3. Constellation OOTB + Pega DX Components

  4. Constellation SDK

  5. DX API

Capabilities and limitations of SDKs

SDKs combined with Pega’s client orchestration APIs provide a guided, iterative development workflow experience to accelerate integrating Pega’s Constellation DX API with an alternative (non-Pega) UI.

SDKs are suitable for the following situations:

  • The organization has a mandate to follow a specific design system and the use of Constellation theming and Constellation DX components cannot meet the standards of the organization’s design system.
  • Adoption of the Constellation design system is prevented by a technical or infrastructural issue.
  • The organization has professional front-end developers who are proficient with web technologies and frameworks such as React, Angular, or Web Components.
  • The organization is willing to incur the increased costs associated with the project implementation and maintenance required to replace Constellation with an alternate design system.

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SDKs support embedding cases in a customer website or application, deploying an application using the SDK’s Web Self Service portal or exposing customer service (CS) tasks to Web Self Service users.

SDKs do not support Pega’s work portal or Insights, and cannot replace Pega’s standard customer service Agent Desktop.