Release date: 2 December 2020

Review the new features, changed features, fixed features, security fixes, known limitations, and supported packages in the Enterprise A2019.17 (Build 7103) release. IQ Bot is on Build 7082.

Migration features

Important: Migration to Enterprise A2019 (currently available only to customers in the Migration Early Adopter Program)

Migration to Enterprise A2019 is currently only available to select customers through our Migration Early Adopter Program. If you are interested in learning more about this program or a timeline for when migration will be available to all customers, contact your Automation Anywhere representative.

The following features apply to both Enterprise 11 and Enterprise 10 :

Obtain information about upcoming support for commands and variables
Bot Scanner provides information about the upcoming Enterprise A2019 release in which a specific command or variable will be supported or available.
Migrate MetaBots with screens
Migrate MetaBots that contain screens as assets. You can migrate screens based on the Java technology and captured using the Object, Image, and Coordinate play modes.

How MetaBots are migrated

View progress of bot migration
A progress bar is displayed in the migration results tab when the system starts migrating the bots.
Migrate bots that use SAP command
You can migrate Enterprise 11 bots that use the GUI Automation command to capture various objects from an SAP application.

Package mapping for migration

Migrate bots that use the following attributes:
  • Regular expression to search for files on which you want to perform an operation.
  • Variable to specify the child bot you want to run.
  • System variables to retrieve information about a device's settings and its performance.
  • The Save header To option and containing array and dictionary variables in the REST Web Services command to store the response header.
  • Bots that contain failure responses from the REST Web Services command by using the Capture failure response option in Enterprise A2019. For Enterprise 11 bots, this option is enabled by default.

    REST Web Services package

  • Variables with names containing Arabic or Russian characters, or Japanese double-byte numbers.

    Unicode range supported in variables

The following features apply to Enterprise 11 only:

Increment loop counter value by 1
The $Counter$ variable used in loop in Enterprise 11 bots is replaced with the $Condition-Counter$ variable in the migrated bots and value for the variable set to 1.

Service Cloud case ID: 00659314

View audit log migration reports
View the status of audit log migration and other related information in the All migrations page. View additional information by using the View migration option for each audit migration instance.

Migrate Enterprise 11 audit logs | View migration reports

Migrate Enterprise 11 Bot Insight data and dashboards
Migrate bots that use the following attributes:
  • MetaBots with DLLs that use credential variables of string, character, or byte data type.
  • The Launch website action of the Browser package to open a website in the Microsoft Edge browser.
  • Shared session to establish a connection with a terminal server or open a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet and close the shared session from the child bot.
  • IBM 5555 B01 and C01 models for TN5250 terminal types and the Default terminal for the VT100 terminal type.

Enterprise A2019

Important: This release includes a required update to your Bot Agent. Ensure that you complete the update to continue with your automation activities when upgrading from a previous release to this release.

Automatically update the Bot Agent | Manually update the Bot Agent

To verify which Bot Agent version is compatible with this release, see Compatibility with release builds.

New features
Connect to EWS server with OAuth authentication

A new authentication is available for the Exchange Web Services (EWS) protocol with OAuth. You can use the OAuth authentication and enable your EWS-managed API applications to access Exchange online in Office 365.

Using Connect action in Email package

Google Cloud Platform supported for On-Premises deployment

You can now host the Control Room, and create and deploy automation on devices configured to use the Google Cloud Platform environment.

Operating system, environment, and platform supported for Control Room

LDAP channel binding for enhanced network security in On-Premises deployment

Control Room supports LDAP channel binding in order to comply with a security release from Microsoft. LDAP channel binding provides enhanced security for network communications between an Active Directory and its clients. It provides a more secure LDAP authentication over SSL and TLS.

Configure LDAP channel binding

Use Bot Agent with AWS WorkSpaces (Service Cloud case ID: 00652474, 00676112)

You can now deploy bots on Bot Agent devices that are configured on AWS WorkSpaces.

Bot Agent compatibility

VT220 terminal type supported in Terminal Emulator

To establish a connection and communicate with another machine, you can now use the VT220 terminal for sending and receiving text.

Using Connect action for Terminal Emulator

Permission to cancel checkout in Control Room

Use the Cancel checkout permission to cancel checked-out Task Bots or files from the public or private workspace.

  • In the public workspace, the status of the bot changes to public.
  • In the private workspace, the status of the bot changes to new if any changes were made to the bot. If there are no changes, the bot is replaced with a clone.

Check out a single bot

Enhancements to the Recorder
  • Record a task using the Universal Recorder or AISense Recorder from a single point of entry. Both recorders are now managed through a single package, which enables faster and more efficient updates.
  • You can now record tasks in a Microsoft Edge browser that runs on Chromium (versions 79 and later).
  • Use the AISense Recorder Define option to capture an object that is only visible when you hover the mouse over the object.
  • Use the Resize window option in the Recorder > Capture action to set the window width and height.

    This option delivers a more reliable bot. It resizes the window to the dimensions at which the task was recorded, thus increasing the likelihood that the bot identifies the target object.

Recorders | Universal Recorder supported applications and browsers | Using the Capture action

Use shared session in Terminal Emulator

Use the new Shared session option to pass the exact state of an application to a concurrently occurring Task Bot or MetaBot logic. For example, instead of connecting to the same application multiple times for different tasks, you can use the option to connect to the application using a single task, thus optimizing your automation logic in the long run.

Share session between Task Bot logic

Share an Excel session between bots

Use the Set session action from the Excel basic or Excel advanced package to assign an Excel session to a variable, and then pass that variable from a parent to a child bot. This enables the child bot to access the worksheet opened in the parent bot.

Excel basic package | Excel advanced workbook operations | Example for sharing an Excel session between bots

New option for Run Task

In the Task Bot package, you can now use the Run action with an option to repeat the selected task until you choose to stop it.
New search for roles in User Management API

Use the new Search for roles API in the User Management APIs in Swagger to obtain a list of all the roles or details for a specific role.
Capture response status of REST API

In the REST Web Services package, you can capture the response status of the REST API in the dictionary variable. The dictionary variable now shows the response key with its value.
New option for REST Web Services (Service Cloud case ID: 00489741, 00646436)

Use the Capture failure response action in the REST Web Services package to capture response details in the response body.
Use regular expressions in packages

You can use regular expressions (regex) in certain actions to support pattern-based search in a file, folder, or Windows title. Regular expressions are supported in the actions of the File and File and Folder packages such as Copy, Delete, Rename, Print Multiple files, and Zip.

You can also use regular expressions in some packages that support the wildcard character in their window titles.

The following packages and actions support regular expressions:

  • Wait
  • Image Recognition
  • Simulate keystrokes
  • Mouse > Click action
  • Legacy Automation > Manage windows control
  • OCR
  • Screen
  • Recorder > Capture
  • Run DLL > Run function (Legacy), Run function
  • Window: Activate, Close, Maximize, Minimize, Resize

Using Copy Desktop file action for file | Using the Capture action

Support for overloaded functions in DLL package

The DLL > Run function action can now handle .dll files that contain multiple functions of the same name. The action calls the function based on the number of parameters passed.

Using the Run function action

New actions for SAP captured objects

Use new actions that are available for Tree, Tab, and Label controls to perform operations for the various objects captured from an SAP application.

Recorder actions supported in various SAP versions

Enhancements to elements in the form builder
  • Image element: Upload image files to the form using this element.

    Using the Image element

  • Button element: Validate all the fields in a form using the Validate all form fields when this button is clicked option.

    Using the Button element

  • Password element: Use one of the following formatting options:
    • Standard: set the character limit and choose additional security options.
    • Custom: add a custom password on the Regular expression page.

    Using the Password element

  • Rich Text Editor element: Use this element in the Set action when creating a bot in order to add or overwrite the value of a variable.
  • Table element: Includes the following updates:
    • New data types for Column settings:
      • Date
      • Number
      • Dropdown
    • The following actions, which you can use during bot runtime:
      • Set action to add rows to the table.
      • Trigger events to add rows and delete rows.
      • Sort table columns.
  • Text Box element: Choose one of the following formatting options:
    • Standard: set the character limit for this field.
    • Custom: add a custom password on the Regular expression page.

    Using the Text Box element

  • Select file or Snapshot element: When you click Preview during bot runtime, the system default application is used to display the selected file.

    Using the Select File element | Using the Snapshot element

Enhancement to List view of bots

In the List view of the Bot editor, you now drag a selected action to the task logic.
Import Enterprise 11 bots to Enterprise A2019 (Service Cloud case ID: 00512847)
  • Bot Lifecycle Management Import feature: The Bot Lifecycle Management import feature enables you to import Enterprise 11 bots from multiple Enterprise 11 Control Room instances to a single Enterprise A2019 instance by using the aapkg file.

    Bot Lifecycle Management | Import bots

  • Bot Lifecycle Management Import API: You can also use this API to import Enterprise 11 bots to the Enterprise A2019 instance by uploading the aapkg file. However, you can import a password-protected aapkg package only by using the Import API.

    BLM API | see Import repository bots in BLM API

New endpoint in License API

Use the List details of Control Room licenses endpoint to retrieve metadata including the license type, number of available licenses, number of licenses used in a specific Control Room instance, and number of licenses used in all Control Room instances.

License API

Programmatically manage device login credentials

Use the Login setting endpoint of the Credential Vault API to set or update the device login credentials to allow bots to run on the device.

Store multiple lines of text in a string variable

You can use a string variable containing multiple lines of text in the following actions:

  • String > Assign
  • String > Extract text
  • String > Compare
  • String > Lowercase
  • String > Replace
  • String > Reverse
  • Log to file
  • Message box
  • The string condition in the If, Wait, and While actions
Arabic, Japanese, and Russian characters supported in variable names

You can now create variables with names containing Arabic or Russian characters, or Japanese double-byte numbers.

Unicode range supported in variables

Changed features
Configure granular security for Bot Agent (Service Cloud case ID: 00653807)

Starting from this release, only registered Bot Agent device IP addresses that are added in the Allowed IP addresses list of the Network Settings can connect to the Control Room. In previous releases, devices from all subnets and IP addresses within the corporate network were allowed to connect to the Control Room URL.

Allowed IP addresses

Update to Excel advanced package

The Open action in the Excel advanced package now opens a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet even when a file extension is not provided.
Disable clone and view content permissions for check-in (Service Cloud case ID: 00656157)

When the Check in permission is selected, the Clone and View content permissions are also automatically selected. As a Control Room administrator, you can now disable the Clone and View content permissions when required.
Associate triggers with unattended Bot Runners

Ensure that the default device is not in locked state if you are associating triggers with unattended Bot Runners.
Additional license support enhancements

Control Room administrators are enabled to install a new GUID license before an existing license expires.
Change in edit device permission

Starting from this release, the permission to edit devices is not available in the system-created AAE_Basic role by default in the Control Room. A user has to select the Edit the device(s) permission separately.

Devices

The following table lists the fixed features and the builds in which they were fixed (Build 7103 is the latest build, and Build 7096 is the previous build). The fixes are cumulatively available in the latest build.
Fixed features
Build number Service Cloud case ID Description
7103 00684905, 00703481 A Task Bot now runs as scheduled and no longer shows the device status as Picked at runtime on the View task in progress (Activity) page when the Task Bot is running.
7103 00676476 An error is no longer encountered when you run a child bot that contains a Japanese full-width space character in the name.
7103 00689935, 00689381, 00690368, 00690217, 0069053 License server syncing error generated when control room licenses and licenses stored on a server are updated on different schedules. This issue has been fixed. Should an error message appear, click "Sync licenses from Server" for any new licenses in production to manually sync the licenses.
7096 00667396, 00670001, 00653771, 00671553 Bot Scanner no longer encounters an error when scanning bots with non-ASCII characters in their name.
7096 00659334 The Offset from match option in the Image Recognition package now works correctly in migrated bots.
7096 00669166 You can now migrate large bots (for example, with 30+ dependencies and 500+ lines) using the Bot migration package. The system no longer encounters an error when migrating a bot that contains a large number of nested IF/ELSE commands.
7096 00659349 You can now migrate bots with special characters in their names.
7096 00670985, 00674145 The system no longer encounters an error due to Bot Store credentials when you migrate from Version 11.3.3 or a later version to Enterprise A2019.
7096 00679817 An unknown error is no longer displayed when you are migrating a bot that the Bot Scanner listed as ready for migration.
7096 00457898, 00488494 You can now register a device with a username that contains non-ASCII characters such as Korean language characters.
Note: Before upgrading the Bot Agent to the current version, ensure that the registered device is configured to use non-ASCII characters.

Configuring post-installation settings

7096 00611887 You can now download an exported bot package using the Internet Explorer browser by opening the download link received in the email. You can also do this from the Activity > Historical page.
7096 00647932 When you create a bot using the Get method action in the REST Web Services package, the UTF-8 character set is now supported. Therefore, Korean characters are processed correctly in the REST API response. Previously, UTF-8 characters were not supported.
7096 00641126 You can now use the Get single cell action in the Excel basic package to extract the date correctly for the Japanese date format. Previously, the Japanese date was displayed in double quotation marks.
7096 00634102 You can now use the Simulate keystrokes package with the Alt+F4 key and set a longer delay value between each keystroke. Previously, the bots displayed an error when a longer delay value was set with the Alt+F4 key.
7096 00655739 In REST Web Services, the Rest API Get call now works properly even when the encoded URL string has special characters such as double quotation marks. Previously, the Rest API Get call failed when the URL string had double quotation marks.
7096 00653944 The String package now shows the correct output when you use the loop action to read a file name that does not have an extension. Previously, when the file did not have any extension, the filename extracted using the loop displayed an incorrect output.
7096 00677941 When an optional field (Mark field required is not selected) is now left blank, a form is validated without any error messages during bot runtime.
7096 00662011 When using the files and folders trigger, you can now use any available network drive to start a bot.
7096 00666441, 00673888 For a folder trigger, you can now select a folder name containing a space character and the bot runs successfully without encountering any issues.

For example, you can select a folder called 'Sales chart'.
7096 00622100 When Simulate keystrokes is enabled for a hot key trigger, you can now start a bot multiple times using the associated hot keys without encountering any issues.
7096 -- If an element is marked as Read-only on the form builder screen, a validation error is no longer displayed for that field during bot runtime.
7096 00570660 You can now use Windows forms with the Run function action of the DLL package.
7096 00624644 The system no longer encounters an error when you upgrade from an earlier version of Enterprise A2019 to a later version when the settings are preserved and the installation path is not the default location.
7096 00670008 You can now pause or resume a task from the Activity > In progress page.
7096 00667210, 00672875 In the Excel advanced package, you can now use the Go to cell action even if the Excel sheet does not have any data or an active cell is out of the worksheet range. Previously, an issue was encountered when you used the Go to cell action and chose the cell option as Active cell with the Beginning of the row, End of the row, Beginning of the column, or End of the column option.
7096 00659098, 00669437 You can now edit the Start date of an existing schedule to today's date, provided the start time is set before the bot is scheduled to run.
7096 00671392 You can now stop a bot that is in progress using the Stop option from the In progress (Activity) page or the Stop option on the runtime window that appears when the bot is being executed.
7096 00647761 You can now define a list variable of subdata type Boolean or datetime within an action. Previously, the bot encountered an error in this scenario.
7096 00671478 Fixed an issue in the Task Bot > Run action where the value of an input variable disappeared when the user clicked Save. This issue only occurred when the Current Task Bot option was selected.
7096 00663719, 00635437 Fixed an issue where the OCR package was missing from Control Room instances hosted on Microsoft Azure. The connection with the Microsoft Azure database timed out before the OCR package .jar file could complete the upload.
7096 00631133, 00636174 In the Wait package, the Wait for condition action in the recorder object no longer waits indefinitely during bot execution. If the required window or its control does not exist, the bot waits for the required window or its control for the time specified in the Wait for control field. If the required window or its control is not found within this specified time, the bot continues to perform the next set of actions.
7096 00628863 Bot files or dependencies are no longer lost when you check in or check out a bot from the private or public workspace when the Elasticsearch service is running and not in index read-only mode. Previously, an error occurred when a bot was either checked in or checked out, and the bot files or dependencies were lost and could not be recovered.
7096 00673520 When a bot is deployed through RDP with a predefined screen resolution, the RDP resolution settings are now applied correctly during bot execution. Previously, the bot was executed with an interchanged resolution (the height and width pixels were interchanged).
7096 00670346 After you edit a bot schedule, the input value of a variable in the bot no longer has to be reinitialized and the bot does not show the default output value for the variable when it is executed.
7096 00653056, 00651853, 00647949, 00657465,00670024 The In progress activity is now displayed correctly for bots deployed on Bot Runners by any user.
7096 -- When developing custom packages, you can now set your name in the vendor column. To set the name, update the author property of the build.gradle file, as shown below:
packageJson{
artifactName = project.name
group = "$groupName"
author = "<entername>"
 }
Leaving the field empty shows the vendor name as unspecified.
7096 -- Multiple users can now simultaneously run a bot associated with a form without encountering any issues on the same Bot Runner machine.
7096 -- You can now migrate Enterprise 11 bots that contain variables that are in a different letter case (uppercase or lowercase) than those in Enterprise A2019. Variables are case-sensitive in Enterprise A2019 but not in Enterprise 11, which previously resulted in an error.
7096 00592758 You can now create a variable with a name that starts with a numerical character.
7096 00670994 You can now register with the Control Room from a multiple-user device configured for Active Directory users.
7096 00677479 The deployment time of a priority queue no longer takes a long time (for example, more than 1 hour) to process Work Items required for workload automation.
7096 00667110 You no longer have to restart the Automation Anywhere Bot Agent service to resume queued Work Items that are stuck in in-progress state.
7096 00673043 When you specify a value in the numOfRunAsUsersToUse parameter of the Bot Deploy API, the weighted system algorithm now assigns tasks to the Bot Runners with the least number of tasks queued and currently running. Previously, the algorithm did not correctly calculate the weight of queued and running tasks, which resulted in an inefficient task allocation to the same one or two Bot Runners.

Known limitations
When a bot opens a website inside a loop, the Recorder Capture action fails after the execution of Launch Website.

Workaround: Add a delay of a few seconds in the loop between the Launch Website and Recorder Capture action.
The Recorder Capture action does not support object recapture for the AISense technology type.
The system does not display a value for a session variable when the variable is selected as Watched variables in Debug mode.
The session variable returns a blank value when it is used as output in a bot and the bot is deployed using the Bot Deploy API.
After an upgrade to the latest version of Enterprise A2019, the bot might encounter an error if you are using the Close action of the Window package version 2.1.0-20200813-181240 or earlier.

Workaround: Add a delay of 50 milliseconds after the Close action in the bot.
The Recorder package takes a long time (for example, approximately 6 hours) to upload to a remote application repository path of an On-Premises Control Room deployed on Microsoft Azure.

Workaround:

  1. Before you install or upgrade to this version, configure the repository path in a local directory of the Control Room node to upload the package.
  2. After installing or upgrading, verify that all packages are available in the Packages page of the Control Room.
  3. Change the repository path to a remote file share.
The AISense Recorder fails if you manually upgrade the Recorder package version, such as by importing a bot that contains a Recorder package version from a more recent build than the destination Control Room. Always upgrade the Recorder package through the Control Room.

Automation Co-Pilot for Business Users (Automation Co-Pilot)

Changed features
Configure scheduler user to allocate device pool to Automation Co-Pilot on the web interface

The Automation Co-Pilot administrator can now configure a scheduler user to allocate the Control Room resources (devices and unattended Bot Runners) to Automation Co-Pilot on the web interface.

The scheduler user must have View my bots and Run my bots permissions and have access to a device pool and Bot Runners. The Automation Co-Pilot process can then use those resources for each bot deployment.

Configure scheduler user for Automation Co-Pilot

End point display

In the Completed panel, the End point has a new display option Update request title that enables the user to update the request title. When the user updates the Display message field, the update is now reflected in request view.

Create a process automation in Process Composer

Use F2 to insert variables

You can now use the F2 keyboard shortcut to insert variables in the process editor.
Fixed features
Service Cloud case ID Description
-- The Task display name option in the Start panel is now set to Request Creation by default. Any name changes by the user is now reflected in the request view.
-- The Feed data into form table in the process editor now works properly and users can now edit the field.
-- In a form that contains a Number field set to a 10-character limit, when you enter the maximum character limit (for example, 1234567890) in the number field in request view, the number values are now accepted.
-- When you create a process with a form that contains a Date element, the Condition option in the If/Else pair action now allows you to enter a variable. Previously, the option did not allow you to enter a variable.

Discovery Bot

Changed features
Zoomed-in view of captured steps is increased

The zoomed-in view in the Screenshot field is now increased from x4 to x8 for better readability of captured steps.
Permissions layout

The layout of the permissions for Discovery Bot is now changed to separate the individual and “all” permissions to easily manage access control.
Fixed features
Service Cloud case ID Description
-- When you create a branch in a view, typically a single step from the current branch is moved into the left branch while a new branch with an empty box is added to the right branch. You can add steps from a different recording only into the empty box in the right branch. Typically, only one step from the original branch is included in the left branch. If the branch is created following the last step in the flow, then no steps will be included in the left branch. You can now add new steps to the left branch in case it was the last step. You can also move the endpoint of the newly created branch lower or higher in the process to include additional steps in the left branch.

IQ Bot

New features
Support for Arabic language
When creating a learning instance, you can now choose the Arabic language from the Primary language of documents drop-down menu, with the following limitations:
  • Advance table extraction is not available.
  • Search field on the is not supported.
  • Arabic numerals are not supported.
    For example, if the document has date or time in Arabic language, it is extracted as text and validations can fail.
    Note: You can still use string-based validation checks (such as regular expressions) for Arabic numerals.
  • Arabic is only supported on ABBYY FineReader Engine 12.4.

Creating a learning instance

Default validations for a group

When editing a learning instance, you can now use the Select the default validations group drop-down menu to select an available group. This allows all the new group documents in production to be extracted based on the custom logic and validations defined in this selected group, before it goes to the Validator.

Edit a learning instance

Fixed features
Service Cloud case ID Description
00500914

The TesseractLog.log file is now available in the following directory: C:\Users\Public\Public Documents\Automation Anywhere IQBot Platform\Logs\Engine\.

The log level is set to error by default. You can change this setting in the CognitiveServiceConfiguration.json file.
00430923, 00618234, 00636422, 00478986, 00414921 All uploaded documents are now rendered correctly, irrespective of their content orientation while uploading, which enables you to train them without encountering any issues. Previously, when you created a learning instance, documents that did not have the correct content orientation (they were upside down or tilted) could not be trained.
00653929 IQ Bot On-Premises: With segmentation improvements, you can now train documents in the Korean language using the Tegaki API OCR engine without any system-identified region (SIR) errors.
-- The system no longer creates any unnecessary folders for successfully classified documents that are uploaded using the IQ Bot [Local Device] package.
-- You can now use the designer page when creating a learning instance to test all the documents, without any error messages.
00590165 For a learning instance, you can now use the See extraction results option to browse all the documents in the selected group.
00672470 After validating the fields of production documents, you can now use the Save current document option to save all the validated document, without any error messages.
-- Check box fields are now extracted with better accuracy. You can use the Checkbox auto-detection feature so that IQ Bot automatically detects the check box fields and radio buttons.
00652269, 00619139 When you now run a bot and try to edit it while it is still running, the following correct message is displayed: Staging Documents for this Vision bot is in progress. Please try after some time. Previously, the following incorrect message was displayed: Learning instance not found.
00601401 When creating a learning instance, you can now use the Thai language for form and field names without encountering any issues.
00624416 When you migrate a learning instance, group descriptions are now migrated without any errors.
-- If you select any field on the Validator screen, the focus from that field is no longer lost when you now click or draw to select SIR.
00662968 Sometimes, when you click See Extraction Results and the preview fails, IQ Bot now correctly displays the following error message after a timeout of 2 minutes: Error occurred while extracting the document. Please re-check the training/document. Previously, when the preview failed, the page kept loading indefinitely.
00674110 Production documents are now moved to the without any errors, irrespective of how the bot was trained (number pages, number of segments in each page, or number of tables and fields extracted).

Bot Insight

New features
New Automation Co-Pilot dashboard in Bot Insight

Use the Automation Co-Pilot dashboard to view various widgets that provide information about requests created from published processes in Automation Co-Pilot. The dashboard also provides statistics on the status of created requests.

Automation Co-Pilot dashboard

Security fixes
Service Cloud case ID Description
-- The Allow Header HTTP header is removed from Bot Insight.

Supported packages