Power Automate Desktop Tutorial Overview

Jul 16, 2024

Power Automate Desktop (PAD) Tutorial

Introduction

  • Presenter: Kevin
  • Purpose: Automate repetitive and mundane tasks using PAD.
  • Example Scenario: Data transfer between two legacy systems with no APIs.

Getting Started with PAD

  • System Requirements: Windows 10 Professional/Enterprise, Work or School Account
  • Installation Process: Office.com > Sign In > All Apps > Power Automate > Create > Install Power Automate Desktop App

Using PAD

Main Screen Overview

  • Top Left Corner: New Flow
  • Recent Flows Section: Run, Stop, Rename, Search Flows
  • Actions Pane (Left Side): Over 300 different actions (File, Web Automation, etc.)
  • Main Canvas: Displays the list of actions in the flow
  • Right Pane: Variables, UI elements, Images

Creating Your First Flow

  • Example: Launch Excel, show message, close Excel
  1. Step 1: Launch Excel (Blank Document, Visible)
  2. Step 2: Show message box (Title: “Launched Excel”, Message: “Successfully launched Excel”)
  3. Step 3: Close Excel (Do Not Save Document)
  4. Testing: Run the flow to see actions executed sequentially

UI Automation and Desktop Recorder

  • Recording Actions: Using Desktop Recorder to capture mouse clicks and actions (Example: Calculator app)
  • Creating Actions Without Recorder: Using 'Click UI element in window’ from Actions Pane
    • Example: Two approaches (desktop recording or adding actions manually)

Advanced Example: Aggregating Order Forms from Word to Excel

Project Overview

  • Objective: Extract data from multiple Word documents and compile into an Excel sheet
  • Scenario: Kevin Cookie Company order forms

Steps to Create Advanced Flow

  1. Retrieve Files: Get files in the folder
  • Use ‘Get files in folder’ action
  • Save file list in a variable
  1. Launch Excel: Open the order tracker sheet
  • Example: Select document path
  1. Loop Through Files: Process each file in folder
  • Use ‘For each’ loop
  • Rename current item to ‘extract’
  1. Launch Application: Open Word document ‘extract’
  • Find app path using search > file location > open file location > copy as path > remove quotes in PAD
  1. UI Elements: Identify elements within the Word document
  • Use 'Add UI elements'
  1. Extract Data: Create variables for each UI element
  • Use ‘Extract data from window’
  • Create variables (e.g., %order_number%)
  1. Write to Excel: Place extracted data into Excel
  • Use ‘Write to Excel worksheet’
  • Specify instance, values, columns, and rows
  1. Close Word Document: Terminate Word to open next document
  • Use ‘Terminate process’

Testing and Execution

  • Run the Flow: Validate the extraction and population of data
  • Multi-Monitor Setup Caution: Ensure using single monitor for consistent UI element behavior

Conclusion

  • PAD allows powerful automation across different applications
  • You can connect desktop flows with web flows for more advanced automation
  • Troubleshooting Tip: Use a single monitor while setting up UI elements

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