Robotics Automation / Desktop Automation

[Joe Glines]

This might interest some of you
Executive Brief- Marine Robotics - An Automation Autobiography by John Slagboom

[Joe Glines]

I was talking with Blackholyman the other day and he mentioned this video on "The Future of Work". It is a very interesting perspective of how work as people typically do it will, eventually, go away and that we need to focus more on things that humans do best (Creative, learning, etc.)

[Joe Glines]

A friend just showed me this webinar tomorrow. People interested in RPA might be interested in signing up.
http://info.symphonyhq.com/rpa-bible-webinar

[Joe Glines]

Here's a recording to a webinar on RPA. While much wasn't relevant for me, there were some interesting datapoints on the first few slides the discussed.


They also followed-up with an answer to my question.
Q. How do we educate business people (CMO, Managers, etc) on what is/is not a good candidate for RPA?

A. Educating key stakeholders on the importance of taking a holistic view when considering their overall digital transformation goals is a good place to start. From there helping them understand that many factors should be considered in order to best determine which processes make good candidates for RPA including:

• How complex is the process?
  How many transactions run through the process in question?
  How much of the process you have the ability to automate (are there multiple process partners end-to-end)?
  How much effort is currently being invested by associates in the process in question?
  Are there ancillary benefits such as enhanced compliance/risk mitigation or improved customer or associate experience?

[Joe Glines]

Review of UiPath, VBA, Python/Selenium & AutoHotkey). I'm curious if they'd hidden IE how much faster it would have run.

[tank]

I could have matched the python performance. this really just shows a lack of skill using AHK

[Blackholyman]

yeah i said kind of the same thing in "What's on your mind?"

[Joe Glines]

I agree however I'm wondering if the same can be argued for the code that was used for the other 3 options. This, to me, would be a good type of "hackathon". Get people from other communities to solve the same goal- then compare / contrast between them. Kind of like Rosetta Code but having people evaluate / rate the differences.

[Repoman]

Hi Guys,

this really just shows a lack of skill using AHK

Most probably very true The biggest struggle i had with AHK (and with VBA too) was to check if webpage element is ready and visible on a webpage. That's why much slower than it should be. With Python - easier to find reliable solution for the problem.

Regarding file picker for csv files - Selenium driver enables script to send keys directly to upload form on a webpage and then handles file picker "on its own" - that's the reason of being faster than others. btw. UiPath does something similar but it is much, much slower.

@Joe - Like the idea! That could be very interesting.

[Joe Glines]

I received this email today from UIPath.

UiPath Academy, now with 360° training
Today, UiPath Academy makes a giant step forward on its path towards complete RPA democratization by expanding the UiPath Academy’s training formula with five free, self-paced courses designed to prepare users for all the key roles of a 360° RPA program.

With this major upgrade, the UiPath Academy becomes the first and only place where technical and non-technical people can build all the expertise they need to set up an RPA Center of Excellence (COE).


What started a year ago out of love for automation has now matured into a growing community of experts where knowledge is shared freely. And, in all honesty, so it should be – it’s amazing to give back and be the first to make RPA education and training freely available to the world. But we’re only just beginning. We hope you’re as excited as we are about turning curiosity into knowledge, because things will keep getting interesting here at the UiPath Academy.

[kellianjaxon]

There are a ton of six figure jobs for Good Automation experts even with no experience with these specific tools. RPA is booming and there is a serious shortfall of people that understand automation. Our company is being crushed by the amount of work we have vs the consultants on staff

How has the demand for RPA developed since the quoted message back in Aug 2017 (tank / others)?

I also wonder what chances one has to land a remote job in the field of RPA. There's ever growing number of business systems and software fully implemented in web environment, so perhaps lack of physical access to customer is not that often a deal-breaker anymone, at least in terms of actual hands-on automation development.

[tank]

Most RPA is going to be at least partially on site. I do a fair amount of work remote as a consultant but only on long projects. Some companies require you to use only their assets. It feels odd to sometimes travel with 2 laptops but sometimes that's the job.

[drizzt]

So I looked up this thread a couple months ago, used UIpath and now back to post my opinion.

I created this automation script first in AHK that takes a spreadsheet with data on it, types it into a window, gets more windows, clicks on those windows etc.
When using AHK I had to manually enter the screen positions of every ui element and the positions of them can change depending on the window... so I had to program each one manually!
in UIpath it does find text. Now I understand that in AHK it has similar scripts like FindText for example. But this is light years behind. In UIpath it does it in the background.

Now I wasnt a big fan of having to develop using a GUI instead of coding but got used to it.

[SOTE]

So I looked up this thread a couple months ago, used UIpath and now back to post my opinion.

I created this automation script first in AHK that takes a spreadsheet with data on it, types it into a window, gets more windows, clicks on those windows etc.
When using AHK I had to manually enter the screen positions of every ui element and the positions of them can change depending on the window... so I had to program each one manually!
in UIpath it does find text. Now I understand that in AHK it has similar scripts like FindText for example. But this is light years behind. In UIpath it does it in the background.

Now I wasnt a big fan of having to develop using a GUI instead of coding but got used to it.

Unless you give examples or show some pictures, we can't be sure if the issue is your lack of programming knowledge or in fact there is a distinct difference about how UiPath is finding UI elements. Furthermore, FindText can be improved and FeiYue has been continually updating it (so people can offer suggestions or add their code) and it's not the only method that can be used.

[drizzt]

For example I created a simple sysview32 tree for testing purposes. now in UIpath all i need to do to click on a specific item in this tree is to use the recorder and click on the number i want. now whenever this script runs, it will click on that number.

The way UIpath works (and modern RPA tools I suspect) is it automatically breaks down all windows into their UIelements and is able to find those elements based on their windows attributes. this is all built into the system.. no need to go on forums and hope that some AHK expert created a library tool like ACCget, findText etc..

The learning curve and amount of effort required is so much greater in AHK compared to UIpath (and probably other RPA tools like BluePrism Automation Anywhere etc)

This simple process would take many many hours of coding in AHK vs 5 minutes in a modern RPA tool.
Maybe one day some AHK guru can create a tool that gives AHK the same functionality as UIpath.

[tank]

fyi the other tools dont handle grids either

[guest3456]

Maybe one day some AHK guru can create a tool that gives AHK the same functionality as UIpath.

and then we'll offer it for sale at a similar price as UIPath

[SOTE]

For example I created a simple sysview32 tree for testing purposes. now in UIpath all i need to do to click on a specific item in this tree is to use the recorder and click on the number i want. now whenever this script runs, it will click on that number.

The way UIpath works (and modern RPA tools I suspect) is it automatically breaks down all windows into their UIelements and is able to find those elements based on their windows attributes. this is all built into the system.. no need to go on forums and hope that some AHK expert created a library tool like ACCget, findText etc..

The learning curve and amount of effort required is so much greater in AHK compared to UIpath (and probably other RPA tools like BluePrism Automation Anywhere etc)

This simple process would take many many hours of coding in AHK vs 5 minutes in a modern RPA tool.
Maybe one day some AHK guru can create a tool that gives AHK the same functionality as UIpath.

There seems to be some confusion. Do you not know about WindowSpy.ahk, that comes with AutoHotkey installations (check install directory), works with standard Windows GUIs, and shows controls?

And, I don't see the problem with using a library tool like AccViewer (https://www.autohotkey.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=40590) for finding controls, etc...

In your previous post, you were referring to working with a spreadsheet, but didn't name what that was. Was that Microsoft Excel or something else? Or are you specifying the issue that you are having is with non-standard Windows GUI programs or Web Browsers? The more vague you are about what you are doing, the harder it is for people to be clear about what is going on.

The learning curve and amount of effort required is so much greater in AHK compared to UIpath (and probably other RPA tools like BluePrism Automation Anywhere etc)

AHK can be used for doing a lot more. The effort required to learn AHK has a great return later on, as it's a more gentle way for regular folk and non-programmers to get into programming and having a great amount of flexibility in the type of utility programs that can be made. At a certain point, AHK users can build their own tools or modify the free open source tools contributed to the community (like with AccViewer). AHK is a scripting language, not just an application. For example, Pulover's Macro Creator is an RPA-like application built years before the term became popular. If a person is so willing, they can modify the existing application or build a new RPA-like one.

I'm not saying that UiPath or other RPA tools can't have certain advantages, but so can AutoHotkey over them, so this can be more of a plus and minus type of thing, where it depends on the subject and what people are trying to do.