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Power Automate for desktop - Build 2404

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This article describes the new features, improvements and fixes to existing functionality that are included in this build.

Visit the Power Automate Blog to stay up-to-date on the latest news!

Installer version 2.43.178.24093 - Microsoft Store version 11.2404.161.0 updates

New Features

  • UI elements collections have now been introduced in public preview. Instead of being isolated to individual desktop flows, collections of UI elements now empower creators and administrators with centralized oversight and control, as they can be shared among numerous users and integrated into various desktop flows as reusable modules. UI elements collections are only available to schema v2 environments.

  • With the help of Copilot, you can now create a flow description with the press of a button in the flow properties, without having to open the flow and read the actions inside it. This feature is available for work or school account users in US-based environments.

  • Makers can now be assigned a Power Automate Premium license automatically. Microsoft 365 admin center's license auto-claim policies enable makers to automatically receive a Power Automate Premium license, in case there is a seat available, and an auto-claim policy is in place. Organizational users without a license will be assigned one upon clicking on the Go premium button, and users on a trial plan will be assigned a license upon signing into the product.

  • New actions for SAP automation group – User is now able to interact with SAP elements with the most easy and straightforward manner. New actions are:

    • Click SAP UI element – send a click to any SAP element.
    • Populate SAP text field element – insert text to any SAP text field.
    • Get details of SAP UI element – extract data from an SAP element.

  • Open Selector builder window from UI/Browser automation actions:

    • Makers can now easily edit and handle the selectors of a UI element while configuring an action of the UI automation and browser automation groups.

  • New Excel actions are now available:

    • Sort cells in Excel worksheet – Makers can create and apply sorting rules in columns in Excel.
    • Filter cells in Excel worksheet – Makers can create and apply filters in a specific column in Excel.
    • Clear filters in Excel worksheet – Makers can use this action to clear any applied filters in an Excel worksheet.
    • Get empty cell – Makers can retrieve empty cells from a range in an Excel worksheet. They can retrieve all the empty cell positions from the defined range or the first one in a defined column/row.

  • Makers can now directly manipulate data sources with expressions, using the new Run Power Fx expression action - available only for Power Fx enabled desktop flows (preview).

Enhancements & Improvements

  • Support for Python v3.4 scripts - Run Python script action now allows for the execution of Python scripts in v3.4.

  • Makers are now warned for password related UI elements in ‘Populate text field in window’ and ‘Populate text field on web page’ actions:

    • When the maker selects a password related UI element as input in the ‘UI element’ parameter of the action and the text to be added is not flagged as ‘Direct encrypted text input’, then a warning is displayed in the designer of Power Automate for desktop.

  • The Troubleshooter application can now diagnose issues related to flows running in picture-in-picture mode.

  • The picture-in-picture window now remembers the values of the “View Only” & “Always on top” settings that were set in the previous launch of the window.

  • The behavior of the Region actions has now been improved, so that when they’re dragged and dropped in collapsed state, the region and all contained actions are moved accordingly as expected.

  • The error message that is thrown in the action ’Add work queue item’ has been improved to become clearer, in case an item being added to the queue has an ID that already exists.

Repaired Functionality

The following list details issues in Power Automate for desktop that are now resolved:

  • An error occurring while opening the flow designer in older operating systems, due to an issue in the .NET framework, has now been resolved.

  • An issue occurring on the font fallback mechanism, in the machine runtime app for Simplified Chinese language users, has now been resolved.

  • When the ‘Optional’ parameter is removed for text input variables, the Blank value is now removed from the variables pane as expected.

  • An unhandled error that occurred for Custom object, List and Datatable input variables, after removing the ‘Optional’ parameter and trying to edit the default value, has now been resolved.

  • An issue that occurred in the variables pane, with the name of custom modules not appearing as expected, when the flow was saved, closed and reopened, has now been resolved.

  • An issue that occurred for Microsoft account users in the ‘Run desktop flow’ action, which was not displaying the input arguments of the selected child flow in case it had any, has now been resolved.

  • A minor issue with the position of the variable picker icon, in the ‘Process name’ parameter of the ‘Terminate process’ action, has now been fixed.

  • An issue occurring in Power Fx enabled desktop flows (preview), which could not be saved if a Power Fx expression ended with the '\' character, has now been resolved.

  • Improved the exception handling mechanism on sign in, by addressing an exception that indicated that there is no network available.

  • Fixed issue with Picture-in-Picture window shown stretched when it was docked in the screen.

  • Handled case where Picture-in-Picture window could be minimized to the extent that buttons disappear.

  • An error with launching browser actions when executed sequentially in Picture-in-Picture and local machine respectively is now resolved.

  • Dismissing the Enable Picture-in-Picture on machine UAC dialog no longer throws an error.

  • Issue is resolved with Repair functionality on a screen UI element when hovering over an RDP window when the Power Automate agent for virtual desktops is not running.

  • Fixed issue with Take Screenshot of web page action.

Other announcements

  • Power Fx enabled desktop flows (preview) created with Power Automate for desktop version 2.43 (April release) and later will support only case-sensitive variables (example: NewVar is different than newVar). From now on, when trying to rename a variable, using a name of another variable that already exists, makers will be presented with a warning dialog. They will be informed that they are trying to use a name that already exists, confirming that they indeed want to proceed with the operation.

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