Robotic Process

Automation in a Day
Lab 4 – Use Input and Output variables
30 mins
June 2022
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Lab Overview
In the previous lab you created your first desktop flow that can automate entering a new invoice
with fixed parameter values for Contoso Coffee shop. However, in reality your automation
should be using real input variables instead of fixed values and it is likely that you will need to
capture real time output from the automation running result as well.
In this lab, you will complete the following tasks:
• Create a new Power Automate desktop flow with predefined inputs
• Record actions performed in the desktop-based Contoso Invoicing application using
these inputs, and capturing application data for output
• Perform a test run of the new desktop flow with a new set of inputs

Prerequisites
This lab builds on the initial setup lab (Lab 1) – ensure all tasks are complete.

Important Additional Prerequisite: As you will be recording actions performed in your UI in

this lab, you will have the best experience if you view the lab instructions on a separate
device or in a printout. You can still complete the lab while pursuing the instructions during UI
action recording, however, you will have to perform extra work to cut the recorded actions of
viewing the instructions from your flow.

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Use input and output parameters

1. First let us open the desktop flow that you have created in the previous lab. You can
open it from Power Automate for desktop app directly, or you can open it from the
browser from Power Automate website. Here we will show you the steps of opening
from the browser. Open the test profile in a browser and navigate to
https://powerautomate.microsoft.com

2. Open Contoso Invoicing app.

3. Select My flows > Desktop flows.

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 4. Edit Enter an invoice flow by hover mouse over and clicking the Edit icon

5. Click Launch app.

6. Power Automate for desktop provides the ability to receive input values from Cloud
flows and return values using output values.

We will now create a series of input values. Move the mouse over the Input/output variables

area, then click the plus sign icon and choose Input option to add your first input.

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7. In the pop-up window, use the values below to set up the first input variable:

• Variable Type: Input

• Variable Name: Amount
• Data type: String
• Default value: $500
• External Name: Amount
• Description: Amount

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8. Click Create.

9. Repeating to click the plus sign then select Input to add 2 more input variables.

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10. Use these values to set up two new added inputs.

• Variable Type: Input

• Variable Name: Contact
• Data type: String
• Default value: [email protected]
• External Name: Contact
• Description: Contact email

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• Variable Type: Input
• Variable Name: Account
• Data type: String
• Default value: WingTip Cups
• External Name: Accountname
• Description: Account name

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11. Click Save.

12. On the right-side Input/output variables area, click the plus icon and select
Output option to add your first output variable.

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13. Use these values to set up the first output:

• Variable Type: Output

• Variable Name: InvoiceID
• External Name: InvoiceID
• Description: InvoiceID

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14. After providing the required values in each field, click Create to proceed.

15. Within our process, we now need to add an action to set this output. Please ensure the
Contoso Invoicing application is still running. Drag the Get details of a UI element’s
attribute in a window action from the tree view menu under UI automation > Data
extraction folder after Step 8 in your actions.

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16. In the pop-up window, click the UI element dropdown and then click Add a new UI
element.

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Note: After you click Add UI element, you will see a red rectangle appears on the screen while
you are hovering the mouse over the elements.

17. Go to Contoso Invoicing app, move the mouse over the value that belongs to ID
number. Hold the CTRL key on your keyboard and then press Left-Click on your mouse
to select the element (Note: you may see a different ID number than the number
displayed here).

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18. Once you select the element, you will see the Text value appeared in tracking session.
Click Done.

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 19. Back to the pop-up window and click Save.

Note: This action will automatically produce a variable called AttributeValue that we can refer
to in subsequent actions within Power Automate for desktop. You can see it from the pop-up
window. You can also click on it to rename the variable if you want to.

20. We will now set the InvoiceID output variable. This allows us to use the Invoice ID in
downstream processes or from our cloud flow in a future lab.
Drag and drop a Set variable action from the tree view under Variables folder to below Step 9
(which is the Get details of a UI element in window that we just created).

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Use the information below to fill out Set variable:
• Set: %InvoiceID%
• To: %AttributeValue%

Note: You can also use the {x} button to browse and select AttributeValue from the dropdown
list.

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21. Click Save to complete this step.

22. Now we will configure the steps to use input variables values when running the
automation. Double click on Step 5 (Edit ‘TextBox’ with ‘WingTip Cups) to open to edit.
Or select Step 5, then click the … icon and select Edit.

23. In the pop-up window, first delete the value in Text to fill-in field.
24. Now select the Account (one of the input variables that we created earlier) by first
clicking the {x} icon and then double clicking to select Account.

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25. Click Save.

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26. Repeat the same steps above to change the value in Text to fill-in in Step 6 and Step 7.
• Use Input variable “Contact” for Step 6
• Use Input variable “Amount” for Step 7

27. Once you are done, your actions should look like the screenshot below.

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28. Click Save to save your desktop flow.

29. Now you have complete configuring using inputs and outputs in your desktop flow. In
the next labs, we will use those inputs and outputs to pass data value between cloud
flows and desktop flows. Now you can test your flow by clicking Run and watch the
automation running using the input variables values (default values).

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Check your knowledge
Lab 4
2 mins
1. If you need to pass parameters from a cloud flow into a desktop flow, where do you
define these values?

A. Run
B. Run next action
C. Input/output variables
D. None of the above

Answer: C. Input/output variables allow the maker to establish parameters that can be
sent from a Cloud flow. In addition, output variables can be used to send data back to
Cloud flows.

2. We need to hold the _______ key on keyboard and then _______ to select the UI element in
Power Automate for desktop.

A. Shift + Right-Click
B. Shift + Left-Click
C. CTRL + Left-Click
D. CTRL + Right-Click

Answer: C. CTRL + Left-Click

3. Which of the following actions allows us to use Invoice ID in downstream desktop flow
actions or is required to return the value to a cloud flow?

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A. Create a new list
B. Set variable
C. Add item to list
D. Increase variable

Answer: B. Set variable – We can set an output type of variable which will capture the
Invoice ID. It will allow us to use the Invoice ID in downstream processes or send back to
our cloud flow that will be created in a future lab.

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