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Democratizing RPA with Power Automate Desktop
Democratizing RPA with Power Automate Desktop

Democratizing RPA with Power Automate Desktop: Boost your productivity by implementing best practices for automating repetitive desktop processes

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Democratizing RPA with Power Automate Desktop

Using Power Automate Desktop and Creating Our First Flow

In the previous chapter, we saw how Power Automate Desktop (PAD) was born and how powerful the tool can be for automating repetitive tasks. In this chapter, we will take a detailed look into the following:

  • What is necessary for installing PAD on a local machine
  • How the application is built up
  • How to create our first flow by using the built-in recorder

To use PAD effectively, a basic understanding of the application is essential, as we will spend most of our time on the very areas presented here. Also, knowledge of the PAD recorder will be extremely helpful throughout this book because it can also save us a lot of time when creating flows. Now, let’s look at how we can get PAD running on our computers.

Understanding the prerequisites for installing PAD

Let’s begin by taking a look at what you need to get Power Automate up and running on a local machine. Two things are required to install Power Automate:

  • A Windows operating system (Windows 10 or Windows 11 Home edition or above) and some hardware requirements/recommendations
  • A Microsoft work or school account to sign in to Power Automate

Since there are specific things to consider, let’s take a closer look at each of these topics now.

The Windows operating system

The minimum hardware to run PAD is a 1.00 GHz processor, 1 GB of free storage, and 2 GB of RAM. As always, the more powerful a machine is, the better the applications will run, and this also counts for PAD. If you are running a local application that should be part of automation and that also consumes significant PC resources, these resources should be counted on top.

The Windows Home editions (Windows 10 and Windows 11) have a few restrictions (https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-automate/desktop-flows/setup) when working with PAD:

  • The first one is that it is not possible to create PAD flows with the Selenium integrated development environment (IDE). If you want to use this IDE to create PAD flows, a Windows Professional or Enterprise edition will be necessary.
  • Selenium is an open source test automation framework for the web. We discussed in the previous chapter that PAD and Robotic Process Automation (RPA) have their origins in testing frameworks for user interfaces, of which Selenium is an example. Selenium also has an IDE (https://www.selenium.dev/selenium-ide/), which you can use to create Power Automate Desktop flows – but only if the underlying operating system is Windows Professional or Enterprise. The second restriction is that a UI flow cannot be triggered from the Microsoft cloud when running on a machine with Windows Home. A PAD flow could potentially be triggered from a cloud flow (Power Automate Flow), and this makes it possible to integrate a local application into a larger context by launching a local workflow triggered by events in the cloud ecosystem.

Integration with the Microsoft Cloud

If you intend to integrate a PAD flow with the Microsoft Cloud, a Windows Professional version or higher is required.

Microsoft account

To be able to access the files for installing PAD, a Microsoft account (formally known as Windows Live ID) is required. There are different types of accounts and all of them are suitable for using PAD:

  • (Personal) Microsoft account: This is probably the most commonly used type of account in the private area. It is free and provides access to Microsoft’s consumer services such as Outlook.com, OneDrive, and Office applications. To sign up, an existing email address can be used or a new one can be created. This account can also be used to sign in to a Windows machine.
  • Work or school account: This type of account is created by an organization that uses Azure Active Directory (AAD) as the authentication and authorization platform. Typically, additional services or subscriptions are purchased that offer additional functionality to users.
  • Organization premium account: This is a special form of work or school account. In this case, the organization is not only managing users via AAD but has also moved certain or all parts of IT to the cloud, such as Exchange, Teams, and Business applications.

With all three types, the full potential of PAD can be unleashed. The organization’s premium account has the following capabilities on top:

  • Connecting and integrating with cloud flows (see the previous comments on the operating system)
  • Collaboration and advanced functionality (such as central Dataverse storage, sharing of flows, as well as centralized management and reporting)
  • Additional premium functionality such as access to AI Builder and unattended execution of flows

For the vast majority of use cases, a personal Microsoft account is sufficient. Nevertheless, in the following chapters of this book, we will see scenarios where a premium account is necessary to access specific services.

Additional notes on accounts

To install PAD, a user with administrator privileges on the device is required. A Windows local or domain account with these privileges should be used. To access PAD installation files, however, one of the Microsoft accounts mentioned previously is necessary. The Windows local account can be associated with the Microsoft account in the corresponding Windows account settings.

Now that we know the prerequisites, let’s take a look at how to install the software.

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Key benefits

  • Learn how Office programs can assist with automating recurring tasks
  • Maintain superior work quality by including daily desktop and web applications in your flows
  • Enrich your flows with additional AI-based information and integrate them with cloud systems

Description

Whether you want to organize simple files or perform more complex consolidations between different Office programs and remote-control applications that don't allow outside access, Power Automate Desktop helps meet these challenges. This book shows you how to leverage this workflow automation platform by explaining the underlying RPA concepts in a step-by-step way. You’ll start with simple flows that can be easily recorded and further processed using the built-in recorder. Later, you’ll learn how to use the more advanced actions to automate folder and file management and enable Office programs to interact with each other. You’ll also get to grips with integrating desktop flows into other cloud environments and further enhance their value using AI. As you progress, you’ll understand how flows can run unattended and how they are managed in the Power Platform, as well as key concepts such as creating, modifying, debugging, and error-handling UI flows. Finally, the book will guide you to use Process Automation Designer (PAD) in conjunction with your frequently used desktop systems to automate routine tasks. By the end of this book, you’ll have become a Power Automate Desktop expert, automating both professional and personal tasks.

Who is this book for?

Whether you’re a home user looking to automate simple tasks on your workstation or a business user or citizen developer seeking to automate more complex rule-based processes, this book will help you overcome the challenge. No knowledge of a programming language is required, but in the more advanced chapters, a general understanding of information technology, including basic programming language structures, protocols, and cloud concepts, will be helpful.

What you will learn

  • Master RPA with Power Automate Desktop to commence your debut flow
  • Grasp all essential product concepts such as UI flow creation and modification, debugging, and error handling
  • Use PAD to automate tasks in conjunction with the frequently used systems on your desktop
  • Attain proficiency in configuring flows that run unattended to achieve seamless automation
  • Discover how to use AI to enrich your flows with insights from different AI models
  • Explore how to integrate a flow in a broader cloud context

Product Details

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Publication date : Apr 28, 2023
Length: 308 pages
Edition : 1st
Language : English
ISBN-13 : 9781803230382
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Publication date : Apr 28, 2023
Length: 308 pages
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Language : English
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Table of Contents

14 Chapters
Chapter 1: Getting Started with Power Automate Desktop Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 2: Using Power Automate Desktop and Creating Our First Flow Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 3: Editing and Debugging UI Flows Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 4: Basic Structure Elements and Flow Control Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 5: Variables, UI Elements, and Images Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 6: Actions for UI Automation Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 7: Automate Your Desktop and Workstation Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 8: Automating Standard Business Applications Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 9: Leveraging Cloud Services and Power Platform Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 10: Leveraging Artificial Intelligence Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 11: Working with APIs and Services Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Chapter 12: PAD Enterprise Best Practices Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Index Chevron down icon Chevron up icon
Other Books You May Enjoy Chevron down icon Chevron up icon

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Morph360Tech May 08, 2023
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Great overview and introduction of RPA and power platform and where it fits in addition the how it all started section.Great section on API and services you explain XML even my daughter got it, really enjoyed reading this book this weekend.Even how I could create a Zip file using compression natively within PAD itself great stuff.Love being able to generate random password using the built in functions and leading into the best practices where so many people fail to plan these out you explain it so well.Overall I think anyone undertaking and process automation would do well to buy a copy of this.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Matthias B. May 12, 2023
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
In den letzten 2 Wochen habe ich das Buch "Democratizing RPA with Power Automate Desktop" von Peter Krause gelesen. Das Buch ist für jeden, der sich mit RPA (Robotic Process Automation) beschäftigen möchte, ein super Einstieg. Es beinhaltet ausführliche Beispiele für private und berufliche Anwendungsszenarien und verleitet dazu, sich "eigene" Anwendungsbeispiele auszudenken, die es zu automatisieren gilt.Ich kann das Buch für jeden, der sich für dieses Thema interessiert, absolut empfehlen! 😉
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Matthew Hopkinson Jun 23, 2023
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Learning Power Automate Desktop, RPA in general or studying for the PL-500?If so this book is a must.It’s easy to read takes you step by step through each topic with loads of great diagrams.I’ll be referring back to this again and again.Thanks Peter.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Amazon Customer Jun 28, 2023
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
Simply stated, this is a great book for learning PAD. It's much better than the Microsoft training in my opinion. The MSFT online training is too basic and doesn't give you the skill you need to use PAD for real life use cases. This book does that. The author does an excellent job of organizing content, providing useful examples, and explaining things that you would never figure out on your own, like how PAD can recognize patterns when you use the recorder. Well done.
Amazon Verified review Amazon
Joshua Brown Jul 06, 2023
Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon Full star icon 5
This was the first book I have come across that fully covers RPA with Power Automate Desktop. This book will provide readers with a solid foundation for developing the skills necessary to build RPA solutions. If you're looking for a deeper dive on the technology than the MS Learning Paths, then be sure to pick this up!Reasons to consider picking this up:- easy to navigate and understand- comprehensive coverage of the technology- quickly get up to speed automating workflows with PAD
Amazon Verified review Amazon
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