Will the current Pega UI be decommissioned once Cosmos is live? if so, then what is the tentative timeline?

The current Pega Infinity UI will still be available and supported for several releases to come.

Apart from screens already build, how can I port the skins created for old version? Can I use as is?

The skin rule form will no longer be used in the React based UI.  We use styled component and theme provider to style the application. You will get access to a complex set of design tokens that should allow you to implement most of the branding and theming

Can we get specific guidance right now for how to develop UI in 8.4 and below to streamline this upgrade/transition process of our existing UI to this new model? Or would it mean redoing UI when this comes along?

This doc should cover the topic - https://design.pega.com/getting-started-design-system

Do we need to rebuild all the current sections using template to start using Cosmos?

In the new React based UI rendering, the section rules are no longer used. There is a new rule type called Rule-UI-View - these rules are updated in App Studio - there will be a tool provided in 2021 that will help convert some of the old sections to views

How can we mitigate challenges while migrating to Cosmos?

Use app studio, avoid using custom control – see https://design.pega.com/getting-started-design-system

How easy will it be to upgrade, especially going from Ver 7.X or even 8.X and with Strategic apps like Customer service or legacy apps, like Smart Investigate?

This will require a significant development effort

How hard will be the upgrades (with a best practices-followed application) to Cosmos UI?

It will likely depend on the amount of customization that has been done from the core application - if you have used the interaction portal of Customer Service as is with no changes and mainly focused on your service tasks, the upgrade should be simple

How will the new UI/UX way of doing improves upgrade?

By following the MVC approach more strictly and having a clear separate of the data and the view, it should be possible to keep the data is your application and how the fields are used in a template and avoid overriding the underlaying template.

I have 7.3 application and shortly planning to upgrade for 8.4.3. Is it wise to put that on hold and wait for full react-cosmos production ready version is released?

https://design.pega.com/getting-started-design-system

I'm excited about Cosmos for new apps, but how can we upgrade apps built in 7.1 (pre-views) to Cosmos without having to rebuild all sections?

there will be some utilities to help identify these sections and make it easier to convert - the conversion will not be completely automated, especially if you have a complex with a lot of nested dynamic layout.

In terms of test automation, if a test suite has been written with the UI tool kit, after conversion of the application to Cosmos, do we need to create a new set of test automation suites?

Data-test-id will be supported in Cosmos React

Is Cosmos version independent of platform version? If Cosmos V1 rolls out with Platform X1, can we use Cosmos V2 with X1?

There are different versions of Cosmos Rules. This is similar to UI-kit. Cosmos Rules v2.0 was provided in 8.5 - for backward compatibility you can keep using Cosmos Rules v1. Cosmos React is not yet released so there is no version right now.

Is there a plan to have an DL wherein customers of Pega can send a use case and have some kind of high-level estimate or Cosmos UI design approach to be followed, also what and how other customers of Pega have been able to implement in Cosmos UI?

You can start to use the guardrail landing page tool - it is available in 8.4 and called 'App studio compliance'. It helps identify if your application is App Studio compliant. This tool will continue to be upgraded to work with Cosmos React.

Is there any automated upgrade UI/UX (Cosmos) wizard for applications who wants to upgrade their UI from previous version to expedite their upgrade plan?

There will be migration tool for rules to list rules that need to be upgraded. If it is possible to upgrade these rules automatically, then we will definitely provide some tools to ease the migration

Are there any guidelines for upgrading an app to 8.6 from lower versions, like any prerequisites before upgrading?

See platform upgrade guides

Is there any UI components that we have to start not using to help cosmos migration later?

Avoid building custom control

No more sections, harness, skin etc.?

Yes - these rules will no longer be used in the new architecture

Is the skin rule also no longer needed if we use Cosmos? Like user portal?

Cosmos React will no longer use the skin rule form

So are we going away with Harness and sections from now?

Correct. These old rules we no longer be used in the new React based architecture.

What kind of current implementations will make it harder to upgrade to this new UI/UX model? Is it probably easier to scrap the existing UI and rebuild new with cosmos?

In some cases, restarting from scratch might make more sense. You should be able to reuse all your case types, data types and integration though. It really depends how much of the UI was customized from UI-Kit or from the Pega Apps core functionality.

What should the process for a project with solutions framework like customer service be upgraded to Pega 8.5? will Pega provide the utilities?

Customer service does not yet support Cosmos – Some doc and tool will be provided when CS will be available on Cosmos

What would be the migration cost when moving to React? Can we expect easy conversion utility to migrate all the existing rules OOTB?

It will not be a simple upgrade. Most of the customization (custom controls, custom JS) will need to be re-written. Having said that, if you have been using App Studio to build your application for case types, views, the migration will be easier

If an organization has a branding style defined (Global CSS) can this view read data from a traditional style sheet instead of Pega Skin Rule?

In this new architecture, the skin rule form will no longer be used - a new rule called rule-ui-theme will be provided to retheme the OTB styles. Some tools will be provided to ease the migration from the old skin rule.

Would we be able to switch to Cosmos from the traditional portal post Pega upgrade / mid of development phase?

Likely not - the decision to use Cosmos vs UI-kit or current Pega Infinity UI vs React based UI rendering needs to be done at the beginning of a project to avoid rebuilding some of the UI. For some sections though, there will not be 'automatic' upgrade - this is similar to conversion of old free form layouts to dynamic layouts

The recommendation is that if you build a new application, you should try to be App Studio compliant as much as possible and follow best practices - for more details https://design.pega.com/getting-started-design-system