Unanswered

Testing Actions

(0) Share

Report

Posted on by VeeLearnMSFT

508

As I have gotten my first taste of building a Web Automation flow to interact with a website and fill out forms, attach documents. I found it quite difficult to test actions. Once i put an action in its place, because it was in a loop I had to start the whole process over and wait until it hits an action to see if it works. If it doesn't, I have to adjust flow, start again, rinse and repeat. I am totally new so I am sure I am doing it the worst possible way but wondering if anyone can offer suggestions on how to test an action. For example below I have an if Image exists, click a button. It wouldn't let me run it from this point as it says it was in a loop or something like that and it didn't let me start at that point. what can I do to test out actions more efficiently...I need to learn to interact with PAD much quicker. Any flow building tips that you may have would help me on this journey.

Categories:

Power Automate Desktop

I have the same question (0)

All responses (2)

Answers (0)

Sort by

UK_Mike on at

Like
a
(0)

Report
Copy link

Link copied!

Starting out, keep the loop at 1, if it works then increase as per.
Build in blocks, dont try and create a whole flow in one go.
Use subflows, if the subflow works, run the next sublow and so on...
Certainly dont try reading dozens of Excel colums, thousands of rows etc...., go slow and youll soon master it.

Was this reply helpful? Yes No
MichaelAnnis 5,727 Moderator on at

Like
a
(0)

Report
Copy link

Link copied!

I can help with the Loop part

For example, if you have the following:

Loop 0 to %Names.Count - 1% increment of 1
'Do something
End Loop

You could actually have an environment variable that tells the system which loop you are on, so if you cancel in the middle of a loop, you can come back to it:

Get Environment Variable %EV_LoopIndex% (should be set to 0 before your first run)
Loop starting at %EV_LoopIndex% to %Names.Count - 1%
Set Environment Variable %EV_LoopIndex% to %LoopIndex% 'set it to the current loop number
'Do something
End Loop

Now, if your loop fails, and you have to reset the program, when it comes to the loop, it will pick up where it left off. Instead of starting at LoopIndex 0, it is going to start at %EV_LoopIndex%.

Good luck!

Was this reply helpful? Yes No