Move bots across environments - You can move bots and files, their dependencies, and packages between Control Room instances in a single flow. The promote bot feature simplifies the process by avoiding the multi-step export and import process when moving bots across across development (Dev), testing (UAT), and production (Prod) environments.

Automation 360

You can move bots and files, their dependencies, and packages between Control Room instances in a single flow. The promote bot feature simplifies the process by avoiding the multi-step export and import process when moving bots across across development (Dev), testing (UAT), and production (Prod) environments.

Before you begin

  • Ensure that you have the Control Room administrator role, or have a Bot Creator or Citizen Developer license with the following permissions:
    • Export bots for the user performing the bot promotion in the source Control Room.
    • All folder level permissions (Run and schedule, Check in, Check out, View content, Clone, and Delete from Public) on the folders containing the bots that you want to promote in the source Control Room.
  • The target Control Room user must have Import bots and Manage packages permission.
  • The target Control Room must have a valid URL.
  • The target Control Room must be accessible from the source Control Room via API, irrespective of where it is located, On-Premises or Cloud or whether it is from the same domain or is from different domains.
  • For Automation 360 Cloud deployments, ensure that the IP addresses of the target Control Room instances are added to the allowed list.

    See Control Room IP addresses for external integrations.

Before you begin

SSL/TLS certificate requirement
Before using Bot promote option, ensure that the SSL/TLS certificate used by the Control Room is valid and trusted by the systems participating in the promotion.
  • The certificate must not be expired or revoked.
  • The certificate hostname must match the Control Room URL used for the promotion.
  • Ensure that the complete certificate chain, including any intermediate and root certificates, is trusted.
  • If your organization uses a privately issued or self-signed certificate, import the required certificate chain into the applicable trust store before configuring Bot promote.
  • Verify that HTTPS communication between the source and destination Control Room is successful.
An invalid, expired, hostname - mismatched, or untrusted certificate can prevent Bot promote from connecting to the Control Room or completing the promotion.
Note: Confirm the supported certificate types and the required certificate installation location with your Control Room administrator.

Procedure

  • Add the list of approved target URLs.
    1. Log in to the Control Room as an administrator.
    2. Navigate to Administration > Settings > Security settings > Bot promotion settings and click Next.
    3. Click Edit.
    4. Enter the Control Room URL in the Verified target Control Room URLs field and click the plus icon.
      Note: Only https URLs are accepted. You can add up to 25 target Control Room instances.
      The validated target Control Room URLs will be displayed in the validated URLs field.
    5. Click Save changes.
      Note:
      • You can remove any URL by selecting the delete option in the vertical ellipsis next to the URL.
      • When importing or promoting bots into a Private workspace, if you import or promote only the parent bot and if the corresponding child automations already exist in the Public workspace of the target Control Room (with the same names), those child automations are automatically checked out to the private workspace.

    See the following video to understand how to add the list of approved target URLs.

    Add approved list of Control Room target URLs

  • Move bots across Control Room instances.
    1. Log in to the Control Room either as an administrator or a Bot Creator with the permissions previously described.
    2. Navigate to the Automation > Public tab.
    3. Click Manage bots > Promote.
    4. In the Promote bots and files page, select the bots, files, processes, or forms you want to move and then click Next.
    5. Select dependencies (if any) and click Next.
    6. Select packages and click Next.
      Note: To exclude packages, select the Exclude bot packages check box.
    7. Provide a meaningful name for the promotion.
    8. If some of the files that are being moved are already available in the target Control Room, select one of the following:
      • Skip the bot or file (don't import it)
      • Overwrite the existing bot or file
    9. Click Next.
    10. Select the target Control Room URL from the drop-down.
    11. Enter the Username and API key for the target Control Room to authenticate.
      Note:
      • To prevent authentication errors, ensure that you provide the correct username and API key.
      • If the API key that you generate is long, you can re-use the same and need not generate the API key every time you promote a bot. If the API key expires, you must generate it during bot promotion. Duration of the API key is configured by the admin.

        For details about generating an API key, see Create API key generation role.

      • As v1 Authentication API is deprecated from Automation 360 v.33, you cannot promote a bot from a source Control Room that is on v.32 or earlier version to a target Control Room that is on v.33 or later version. For example, if the source Control Room is on v.29, the target Control Room can be on any of these versions, v.29, v.30, v.31, or v.32 but it cannot be v.33 or later versions.

        For more details about v1 Authentication API deprecation , see Completed feature deprecations.

    12. Click Promote bots and files.
      • The promoted bots and files appear in the target Control Room.
      • When bots are promoted, they are checked in to the target Control Room. If you choose the overwrite option, their version increments in the targetControl Room.
      Note:
      • Bots and files are promoted from and to the public workspace only.
      • You can promote bots and files, including all dependencies, up to a maximum bundle size of 1 GB.
      • You can import, export, or promote the bots with dependencies such as parent and child bots, dependent files such as XLS, CSV, PDF, and WLM Work Item defined. However, the Global Values (GV) and Credential Vaults (CV) that are used in the bots cannot be imported, exported, or promoted.

    See the following video to understand how to move bots across Control Room instances.

    Move bots across control room instances

The below table describes some common symptoms, cause, and recommended actions to troubleshoot the issue.
Symptom Likely cause Recommended action
Bot promote cannot connect to the Control Room Certificate is not trusted Import the root and intermediate certificates into the required trust store
Hostname verification error Control Room URL does not match the certificate Use the certificate’s valid hostname or replace the certificate
Connection stops after a certificate renewal New certificate chain is not trusted Import the renewed certificate chain and restart the applicable service
SSL handshake or PKIX error Missing intermediate certificate Install the complete certificate chain

What to do next

Validate the certificate configuration
  1. Open the source and destination Control Room URLs from the relevant server or host.
  2. Verify that the browser or connectivity tool reports no certificate warnings.
  3. Confirm that the configured URLs use the same hostnames included in the certificates.
  4. Run a Bot promote connectivity or authentication test before promoting production bots.