Enjoyed this article? This is part of our Ultimate Constellation FAQ series.

1. What guidance and tooling does Pega provide for clients who are starting their Constellation adoption journey?

A good place to start is by looking on https://docs.pega.com/category/constellation-adoption-strategies-playbook. This Q&A document also covers many additional topics based on questions and conversations with multiple practitioners and clients.

2. Converting an existing Pega application to Constellation may demand a significant effort and cost investment to recreate custom features. How should I approach ROI justification?

Pega does not advise migrating/recreating apps for the sole purpose of using the latest technology. There should be a compelling business reason to justify the investment. Compelling business reasons include accessibility issues, security, adding new self-service and GenAI capabilities, and more.

The advice to clients adopting Constellation is to start with a new app and gain experience. Once teams are comfortable delivering with Constellation, look at existing apps and determine the best course of action. Adoption pathways for existing applications include blending, reimagining, and simply doing nothing in the near term.

3. Are "Coexistence" and "Blended" the same thing?

The two concepts are related, but not identical.

In the context of platform-based Pega apps the term "blended" is used. This means that you can "blend" by exposing existing cases (built with section/harness) inside a Constellation portal. While it is possible to surface new Constellation case types in a traditional portal. This pattern is not typically advised and available for edge cases and Pega clients with extremely customized traditional portals.

In the context of Pega Customer Service on Constellation, we use term "coexistence" which is the ability to render your existing Service Cases (built with section/harness rules) inside a CS Constellation portal.

For platform apps and blended mode, see:  https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform/page/platform/user-experience/blending-traditional-constellation-uis.html and https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform/page/platform/user-experience/adding-traditional-case-constellation.html

For Customer Service coexistence, see https://docs.pega.com/bundle/customer-service/page/customer-service/uikit-implementation/case/constellation-case-types.html

4. Is Blended UI and Coexistence a permanent solution or is it a bridge to modernize to Constellation?

It is a bridge. We anticipate that all applications will eventually be on Constellation. Non-Constellation applications should be incrementally modernized to Constellation based on justified business needs.

It is important to clarify that most incremental modernizations will occur in small tranches over 3-18 months and can be paired with creation of new business value such as new process automations, enhanced enterprise reuse, better accessibility, expanded channels like self-service, and agentic advancements. Incremental modernization, efforts can also be incorporated into existing maintenance and enhancement cycles.

There are following paths to leveraging an existing Traditional UI app in Constellation:

• Blended
• Coexistence
• Pega Process Fabric

Each gives you a long runway in your path to modernization. It continues to work until you modernize all your case types. The current recommended approach is using Process Fabric.

It is a runway, there may be some Case Types you decide to modernize in more distant future. These solutions will be available for the long term to support the strategy that suits your case.

5. Can we use Constellation for the existing applications which don't have Case Types at all?

No. Workflow automation is the primary purpose of Pega. Case Types with Stages and Steps using the Case Designer is foundational for Constellation apps and usage is required.

6. Where can we find more Blended UI and Coexistence related documents and samples?

Here are some resources. Case studies and samples will be emerging soon:

Platform

• Adopting blended UI in an application

• Blending Traditional UI and Constellation | Pega Academy

Customer Service

• Enabling coexistence
• Pega Process Fabric Hub integration for Pega Customer Service on Constellation
• Coexistence for Constellation service requests | Pega Academy

Other references

• Constellation Adoption Playbook
• CLSA Community: Integrating Constellation with your existing apps in Infinity '23 | Pega

7. How is the Blended UI technically working?

The primary method for Blended UI is within a single application stack where either the Constellation-based application of the Traditional UI application is setup as a built-on app.

This allows:

• Reuse of existing case types, data types, and rules.
• Development of new case types using Constellation while still running legacy ones.
• A unified portal experience where both UI types coexist

Additional details are found below:

• https://academy.pega.com/challenge/blending-traditional-ui-and-constellation/v1?

• https://academy.pega.com/challenge/blending-traditional-ui-and-constellation/v1?
• https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform-241/page/platform/user-experience/adoption-strategies-blended.html?workflow=constellation-adoption-strategy-blending-uis

• https://community.pega.com/event/clsa-community-integrating-constellation-your-existing-apps-infinity-23?
• https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform/page/platform/user-experience/blending-traditional-constellation-uis.html
• https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform/page/platform/user-experience/adding-traditional-case-constellation.html

8. Is there a different Constellation modernization guidance for Theme Cosmos applications?

Theme Cosmos is Traditional UI architecture. All guidance related to Traditional UI applies to Theme Cosmos. There is no unique approach for Theme Cosmos applications.

9. Does Pega plan to update accessibility and security on Traditional UI. If yes, how frequently?

At this time, Pega is prioritizing Constellation enhancements, including accessibility and security, over Traditional architecture enhancements. If accessibility and security in your Traditional Pega applications do not meet business or regulatory requirements, we recommend that you modernize those applications to Constellation to mitigate risks and meet business needs. However critical accessibility or security fixes is something that Pega continues to enhance in Traditional UI (depending upon how critical it is).

10. For existing apps modernizing from UI-Kit/Theme Cosmos to Constellation using Blended UI, do re-usable features (e.g., Customer Search) built using UI-Kit/Theme Cosmos need to be re-built?

Yes. Custom features built using UI-Kit/Theme Cosmos will need to be configured in Constellation. In the example of Customer Search, you will use the new Constellation Search and Select pattern available in Infinity 24.2.

11. What is Pega’s guidance for achieving enterprise reuse between Traditional applications and Constellation applications?

Reuse can be achieved by leveraging Pega’s Situational Layer Cake and modular design.

The Enterprise layer is very lightweight, only holding common assets that are applicable across the enterprise like UI styling, security, and authentication

Modules are built-on applications containing reusable processes, flows, decisions, data pages, views, and other reusable rules that address a specific business, integration, or utility use case.

Existing integrations and objects can be encapsulated into Modules for reuse between Theme Cosmos and Constellation applications. The Module should provide abstraction to the underlying integrations and objects. Some update of existing assets might be needed.

12. Any data migration required when moving existing application to Constellation?

One goal of offering blended UI and coexistence is to avoid the need for large data migrations. That said, some client strategies do employ data migrating as part of a transition when data models need to be dramatically updated.

A word on data modeling in Traditional UI. After reviewing many Pega applications across industries, it’s clear that traditional architecture inadvertently left opportunities for “lazy data modelling.” Here is an example of what that means in traditional architecture:

A field of type text is defined. On screen in the UI, this text field is represented as a drop-down menu populated with references to a data object. On selection, related fields are populated. In Constellation, the field would be Picklist instead and would refer to a Data Page.

So, in this scenario, you’d likely find the need for some fixing of the data model.

More information can be found in documentation: https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform-241/page/platform/user-experience/migrating-constellation-ui.html

13. Existing Traditional UI applications have some complex business logic, class inheritance updated etc. Can these be identified by the modernization assistant and provide solutions when moving to Constellation? Or should these be rewritten from Constellation?

Most issues identified by the Constellation Modernization Assistant (CMA) are also guardrail warnings.

Remediation of issues will depend on the details of the implementation of business logic. Common issues include the use of named pages [in activity and data transform rules] and mistyped fields.

Please note: You do not need to use the CMA tool to identify that applications without defined Case types, Stages and Steps will need to be reimagined starting in Blueprint. Similarly, non-autogenerated flow action rules will need to be recreated in the new architecture. This is an opportunity to recreate using OOTB configurations and reduce technical debt.

14. In my current application we don't have Case Types and when we migrate to Constellation, we are planning to change to Case Types. In flow we have an assignment, and it has 3 flow actions. In UI Kit, FA would have rendered on UI and other 2 would go to other actions. Does Constellation support this?

Yes. There are two possibly solutions:

Optional actions (with optionally promoted action) Optional actions can be configured for the Case type and/or stage. You may also highlight the most used action on a stage, or for a Case type, by using the Promoted actions setting.

Handle with flow navigation Having many actions come out of an assignment can now be implemented by capturing a choice from the user and having that drive a decision shape to follow the relevant flow paths.

15. Are there any cost metrics on upgrading existing applications? Say based on output of assessment tool can we get a ballpark assessment on the cost?

No. The CMA tool is meant to create source information for inclusion in a project plan. Because there are often multiple ways to achieve the same outcome using Constellation, there is no reliable mechanism to anticipate future choices for resolving issues.

Pega teams have done considerable research on sizing and scoping for Pega Consulting estimations. Ultimately, the cost will be based on your team's overall average velocity. Expect velocity to increase dramatically during the first few sprints as team(s) orient to the new style of configuration.

16. Are there any tools or methodologies for user experience monitoring in Constellation? Can it provide data for clients who want to monitor navigation/feature usage stats and page load time?

Not right now. Although this question comes up occasionally, if more clients are interested this would be great feedback for the product team.

17. Due to old limitations in UI-Kit/Theme-Cosmos, the customer has chosen to ignore Pega-UI and is using a different technology only for front end. What is the best way to bring back to Pega?

Suggest Constellation as it is flexible enough to work custom fronted and integrate with Pega Infinity over DX API and SDKs.

18. For Blended UI do we have the architecture/design pattern documented somewhere for LSA community to understand and implement?

There are two primary use cases for Start with our CLSA webinar on Blended UI: https://community.pega.com/event/clsa-community-integrating-constellation-your-existing-apps-infinity-23

There is also Pega Docs explaining each side of the pattern:

• https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform-241/page/platform/user-experience/integrating-constellation.html
• https://docs.pega.com/bundle/platform-241/page/platform/user-experience/constellation-in-traditional-ui.html

19. How can effort and cost to migrate/adopt Constellation be determined for existing applications? Will additional efforts be needed to move applications that use frameworks like Customer Service etc. to Constellation?

The Constellation Modernization Assistant (https://community.pega.com/marketplace/component/constellation-modernization-assistant)  provides a list of rules that need rework. This is an initial metric to suggest the volume of work given a rule count.