Step Actions
This topic provides an overview of the available step actions.
You can add the most commonly used steps directly to the Insert Step menu that is available when you right-click a connection in the Robot view in Design Studio. See General Editing for details.
- Standard
-
This category contains the most commonly used step actions.
Action
Description
Assigns a value to a variable.
Creates a step to call a Desktop Automation robot from a Web Automation robot.
Creates a new page.
Deprecated. See "Call Desktop Automation Robot."
Open Variable Opens a variable attribute - or a variable of simple type - in the view.
Loads a web page from a URL.
Returns a value from the robot.
Stores a value in a database.
Causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue depending on a boolean value.
- Assign/Transform Variable
-
This category contains the most commonly used step actions.
Action
Description
Assigns a value to a variable.
Converts the values of one or more variables by running them through data converters and storing the results in the same or other variables.
Transforms XML using XSLT.
- Browser Session
-
This category contains step actions for saving and restoring entire browser sessions, as well as for extracting and manipulating cookies and HTML 5 web storage.
Action
Description
Saves a session in a variable for later restoration by another robot run.
Restores a session in a variable previously saved by another robot run.
Extracts the value of a cookie matching patterns for name, domain, and path.
Creates a cookie with the specified domain, path, name, and (optionally) value.
Removes one or more cookies matching patterns for name, domain, path, and value.
Extracts data from the local and/or session storage. The data is stored in a variable in JSON format.
Loads data into the local and/or session storage. The data must be specified in JSON format.
Clears data in the local and/or session storage.
- Browser Windows
-
This category contains step actions for opening, selecting and closing browser windows.
Action
Description
Creates a new window.
Selects another window as the current window, such as the window that subsequent steps will work on.
Closes a window.
- Call Web Service
-
This category contains step actions for calling REST and SOAP web services.
Action
Description
Calls a REST web service and loads the result into the current window or stores it in a variable.
Submits a SOAP XML request to a web service and returns a SOAP XML response.
- Click/Move Mouse
-
This category contains step actions that mimic clicking or moving the mouse to and from elements in the browser view.
Action
Description
Emulates a mouse click on the found tag.
Emulates a mouse move to the found tag.
Emulates a mouse move away from the found tag.
Emulates scrolling a document or tag.
Emulates scrolling the found tag into view.
- Database
-
This category contains step actions that can store, retrieve, query or delete items in databases.
Action
Description
Stores a value in a database.
Finds a value in a database.
Calculates the key used to store the value of the selected variable.
Deletes an value in a database.
Submits an SQL query to a database, and loops through the results.
Executes an SQL statement on a database.
- Enter Data in Form
-
This category contains step actions for entering data in web forms.
Action
Description
Enters a text into a text field in a form.
Enters a password into a password field in a form.
Emulates pressing a key in a form.
Selects an option in a drop-down box or a list box in a form.
Selects multiple options in a list box in a form. Note: This action can only be used for list boxes, not drop-down boxes.
Selects or clears a check box in a form.
Set Range Value Sets a numeric value that must be no less than a minimum given value, and no more than a maximum given value.
Selects a radio button in a form.
Selects a file to upload in a file field of a form.
- Extract
-
This category contains step actions for extracting data. Data may be extracted in text or HTML form from a web site, or from other formats such as PDF, CSV, Excel and Flash. It is also possible to extract images or specific data about the HTML or XML source such as attribute values or link URLs.
Action
Description
Extracts some text, runs it through a list of data converters, and stores the result in a variable.
Extract Binary Content Extracts binary content from the Browser View. Extracts content from an Excel page, runs it through a list of data converters, and stores the result into a variable.
Extract Column in Data Row Extracts data from a cell in the current range to a variable. Extract from E-mail Extracts information from a saved email. Extracts a form parameter from a form URL in the found tag.
Extracts content from a Flash object.
Extracts text from a PDF document contained in a variable.
Extracts an image and stores it in a variable or a file. It can optionally store the content type and file name of the image in other variables.
Extract JSON Extracts the part of a JSON value found by the JSON finder as a JSON value into a variable. Extract Path Extracts the absolute path of the element found by the finder. Extract Property Name Extracts the property name of a JSON value found by the JSON finder into a variable.
Extracts an image from the current page and saves it in a variable.
Extracts the text or value of the selected option, runs it through a list of data converters, and stores the result in a variable.
Extract Source Stores the previewed data in a variable. Extracts a tag attribute from the found tag, runs it through a list of data converters, and stores it in a variable.
Extracts data from a URL target and stores it in a variable or a file. It can optionally store the content type and file name of the loaded data in other variables.
Extracts a URL from the found tag and stores it in a variable.
- File System
-
This category contains step actions for accessing the file system. You may read, write and modify files and directories, loop over files in a directory, or test for the existence of a given file.
Action
Description
Loads data from a file, either into the browser window or to a variable.
Loops through the files in a directory.
Writes a new file or appends to an existing file.
Causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue depending on whether a specific file exists.
Fetches metadata about a file in the file system.
Copies a file on the local file system where the robot is executed. The action generates an error if the destination file exists.
Deletes the specified file or directory.
Creates a new directory.
Renames a file or directory on the local file system where the robot is executed. The action generates an error if the destination (New Name) exists.
- Loop
-
This category contains step actions for looping. You may loop through HTML structures, windows, comma-separated values, form values, Excel ranges, or crawl entire domains. For looping through HTML structures, you have two options: For Each Tag and For Each Tag Path. The For Each Tag step action is the simpler of the two; it is used to loop through the immediate children of the found tag, while the For Each Tag path can loop through similar tags at any depth within the found tag. To loop through a number of pages connected by Next links or the like, you must use the Repeat and Next step actions.
If the selected element does not contain any sub-elements to loop through, all For Each steps throw an error. For example, the For Each Tag Path step throws an error if the found tag does not contain any tags to loop through.However, when using the For Each File step to loop through files in a directory, if no files are present in the directory, this is not regarded as an error, and no error is thrown.
Action
Description
Loops through tags contained immediately inside the found tag.
Loops through tags contained at any level inside the found tag.
Loops through the URLs contained in the found tag.
Loops through the options in a drop-down box or list box in a form, selecting one option in each iteration.
Loops through a group of radio buttons, selecting one of the radio buttons in each iteration. The found tag must be one of the radio buttons in the group.
Loops through the specified values, entering one value in the text field in each iteration.
Creates a repeat loop together with the Next action.
Requests another iteration in a repeat loop created using the Repeat action.
Loops over the rows, columns, cells in the found range or over all the sheets in the Excel page.
For Each Data Row Loops through data rows in a CSV file. For Each Property Loops through all properties of a JSON object. For Each Item Loops through a group of tags. For Each File Loops through the files in a directory. Iterates through the browser windows, setting each in turn as the current window.
Splits a text at a specified delimiter and loops through the parts.
Gets the current iteration of an enclosing loop step.
- Load Page
-
This category contains step actions for loading pages from a given URL or creating a new page based on already extracted content. If required, you can also specify the page load request at the basic HTTP level.
Action
Description
Loads a web page from a URL.
Creates a new page.
Performs a Raw HTTP request of the selected method.
Open Variable Opens a variable attribute - or a variable of simple type - in the view. View as Excel Opens downloaded Excel content in an Excel view. View as JSON Opens downloaded JSON content in a JSON view. View as XML Opens downloaded XML content in an XML view. View as CSV Opens downloaded CSV content in a CSV view. Extract Source Stores the previewed data in a variable. - Make Snapshot
-
This category contains step actions for saving offline snapshots of web pages. To save an offline HTML copy of a page and its resources, use Make Snapshot. To save multiple interlinked HTML pages, use Rewrite Page and Rewrite Style Sheet.
Action
Description
Creates a snapshot of the current window, including its frames and resources.
Extracts the HTML content of the current window and additionally rewrites and outputs the links to style sheets, images and other pages.
Acts as a helper for Rewrite Page. It task is to rewrite links to other style sheets or images in a given style sheet.
- Modify Page
-
This category contains step actions for modifying the current web page, such as by removing, replacing or inserting content.
Action
Description
Inserts a new tag.
Replaces the found tag with a new tag.
Removes tags from found tags. The Remove rules are executed in the order listed below. Any tags matching one or more of the Except rules are not removed. Defining no Remove rules defaults to removing all tags.
Removes a range of tags.
Hides the found tag.
Unhides the found tag.
Divides the text in the found tag into pieces.
Removes from the input <table>-tag all rows (<tr>-tags) that do not have a specified number of columns (<td>- and <th>-tags).
Transposes (flips) the input <table>-tag by mirroring its <td>-tags along the top-left to bottom-right diagonal.
Normalizes a table by inserting extra cells to eliminate rowspan and colspan. The content from the original cell is copied to the new cells.
- Output
-
This category contains step actions for returning values to the API that called this robot, sending e-mail and writing to files or logs.
Action
Description
Returns a value from the robot.
Sends an email. Note that the email is not sent during execution in Design mode in Design Studio.
Writes a new file or appends to an existing file.
Writes a message to the log. This is useful when debugging a robot.
- Test
-
This category contains conditional actions for testing, such as stopping the execution down the current branch if some condition is satisfied. This condition may depend on the contents of the found tag, a variable, or the existence of a given window.
Action
Description
Causes execution down the current branch to stop or continue, depending on the contents of the found tag.
Causes execution down the current branch to stop or continue, depending on the URL contained in the found tag.
Causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue, depending on a boolean value.
Causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue, depending on one or more variable values.
Tests the number of columns in a table row.
Causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue, depending on whether a specific window exists.
Causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue, depending on the type of the page.
Tests the cell type, such as Blank or Number of the found range and causes execution beyond the step to stop or continue depending on whether all cells in the range are of the given type.
Test JSON Type Tests the type of a JSON value. - Excel
-
This category contains actions that are specially designed for Excel pages.
Action
Description
Extracts content from an Excel page, runs it through a list of data converters, and stores the result into a variable.
Extracts the name of a sheet in a spreadsheet document and stores it in a variable.
Extracts a hyperlink from a cell in a spreadsheet.
Loops through different elements of a spreadsheet.
Extracts a part of a spreadsheet document as an HTML table and stores it in a variable.
Inserts the specified content to a spreadsheet cell.
Sets the value of a cell.
Sets the content of a column in a spreadsheet from a variable of complex type.
Sets the content of a row in a spreadsheet from a variable of complex type.
Sets the format of one or more cells in a spreadsheet.
Sets the sheet name.
Inserts a hyperlink to a cell.
Sets the width of a column in a spreadsheet.
Sets the height of a row in points.
Sets the value of an information property in a spreadsheet.
Inserts a new sheet in a spreadsheet.
Inserts one or more rows in a spreadsheet.
Inserts one or more columns in a spreadsheet.
Removes the selected sheet from a spreadsheet.
Removes the selected rows from a spreadsheet.
Removes the selected columns from a spreadsheet.
Tests the type of one or more cells.
Marks the found range as a named range, so that it can be used as a reference when finding ranges in subsequent steps.
Changes the auto evaluation option for an Excel value of an Excel variable, allowing to enter any unsupported function into a cell, not causing an error.
- JSON
- This category contains step actions for managing JSON values.
Action Description Extract JSON Extracts the part of a JSON value found by the JSON finder as a JSON value into a variable. Extract Property Name Extracts the property name of a JSON value found by the JSON finder into a variable.
For Each Property Loops through all properties of a JSON object. For Each Item Loops through a group of tags. Set JSON Replaces the entire found part of a JSON value with a new JSON value. Set Property Name Replaces the property name of the found JSON object with a new name. Insert JSON Inserts a new property into a JSON object or a new item into a JSON array. Remove JSON Removes the found JSON from a JSON value. Test JSON Type Tests the type of a JSON value. Set Named JSON Marks the found JSON as a named JSON. - XML
- This category contains step actions related to XML.
Action Description Extract Extracts text and stores it in a variable Extract Tag Attribute Extracts a tag attribute from the found tag, runs it through a list of data converters, and stores the result in a variable.
For Each Tag Loops through a group of tags. For Each Tag Path Loops through all tags of a given type in the subtree of the found tag. Set Tag Replaces the entire found tag with new content. Set Content Sets the specified content on a tag. Set Text Replaces the content of the found tag with a text. Set Tag Name Replaces the name of the found tag with a new name and optionally copies the attributes of the found tag to the new tag. Set Attribute Inserts or updates an attribute on the found tag with a specified name and value. Insert Content Inserts the specified content into a document relative to the found tag. Remove Tag Removes the found tag from its parent node. Remove Content Removes all the content of a tag. Remove Attribute Removes an attribute from a tag in XML. Test Tag Makes a test to determine whether execution should be allowed to continue down the current branch. Set Named Tag Marks the found tag as a named tag, so that it can be used as a reference when finding tags in subsequent steps. - Other
-
This category contains various other step actions.
Action
Description
Marks the found tag as a named tag, so it can be used as a reference when finding tags in subsequent steps.
Marks the found range as a named range, so that it can be used as a reference when finding ranges in subsequent steps.
Set Named JSON Marks the found JSON as a named JSON. Unmarks a selected named tag or range, or all named tags/ranges, so they are no longer be named in the subsequent steps.
Does nothing.
Waits for a specified period of time.
Resume Browser Resumes the browser and lets it run after either specified wait criteria are met or the browser becomes idle (whichever comes first).
Causes the execution of the robot to stop without errors.
Generates an error.
Executes a command line or shell script. Ensure a RoboServer has sufficient privileges for this operation
Changes the proxy server.
Executes JavaScript.
Retrieves a user password from the Password store.