I was really happy to see the selective synchronization functionality added to Mendix 8.18. It’s a real improvement to furthering the developer to be in control of data needs to get synced at each stage.
What I did notice right off the bat is that there’s one thing I’m still looking for. Right now you can select Objects or lists of Objects from your nanoflow and have them synced. That’s awesome for any change you’ve made on the device and want synced to the runtime without triggering all entities to be synced.
But wouldn’t it be great if it was also possible to choose entities to sync rather than the specific objects themselves? I would imagine it to be an additional option to the Synchronize action, where you’d be able to see the list of entities used in your offline profile (similar to the Synchronization configuration that’s available from the Navigation) and tick the entities you’d want synchronized. That way you’d ensure any new additions to your selected entities also get loaded onto the device instead of having to resolve to custom logic from within a microflow. I believe it will also maximise the flexibility for the developer in deciding what data is synced and when.
An example of this is working with Appointments, which can shuffle throughout the day, resulting in start/end times cahnging.