r/PowerAutomate • u/SiteAdept1458 • 6d ago

Power automate desktop help

I do data entry but it requires me to get the information from one website and put it in manually its extremely time consuming and just out right boring. Ive set it up to where I can have it do the input for me very slowly which is fine. But im trying to get the information faster that way I can streamline the input because at this time its taking like an hour to get the list ready. With PAD im sure it can be cut down to like ten minutes for getting the list. How ever I keep running into an issue where its not attaching to chrome. Even with the help of Ai it keeps on sending me on a wild goose chase. My plan was it selects the tab copies the whole page then pastes it into word. Goes back to the tab closes it and moves onto the next tab. It wont do that because the tab name changes. Ive tried changing it to search for * because Ai told me it would make it a wild card and that doesnt work. Any tips or help? Tbh id prefer if the whole thing was stream lined and one day ill make it like that (cant let my bosses know haha, or ill be out of a job) but for now ill just keep the extraction and entry seperate.

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u/CuriosityMeridian 5d ago

There is a discord server for power automate desktop. Try asking there, they can help if you’re struck at any point

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u/SiteAdept1458 4d ago

Do you have it handy by chance?

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u/chiibosoil 4d ago

I assume you have installed Power Automate browser extension?

Install Power Automate browser extensions - Power Automate | Microsoft Learn

However, Power Automate for web scraping has it's limitations.

  1. If the page/site is JavaScript-rendered dynamic content... you will need different approach.

  2. If the site is poorly structured DOM... it can get interesting.

  3. If using to scrape commercial site, they may implement IP block or other anti-scraping method. This will complicate things for full automation.

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u/SiteAdept1458 6d ago

​Line 1: Launch Word ​Line 2: Loop (Start: 1, End: 100, Step: 1) ​Line 3: Focus window (Window class: Chrome_WidgetWin_1) ​Line 4: Wait \rightarrow 0.3 seconds ​Line 5: Click (Click on screen at X: 500, Y: 500 to force focus inside the webpage) ​Line 6: Send keys (Foreground window) \rightarrow {Control}(a) ​Line 7: Wait \rightarrow 0.2 seconds ​Line 8: Send keys (Foreground window) \rightarrow {Control}(c) ​Line 9: Wait \rightarrow 0.3 seconds ​Line 10: Get clipboard text (Produces %ClipboardText%) ​Line 11: If (%ClipboardText% Contains Freeze Protect Required, Ignore case: ON) ​Line 12: Send keys (Foreground window) \rightarrow {Control}(w) ​Line 13: Wait \rightarrow 0.5 seconds ​Line 14: Next loop ​Line 15: End ​Line 16: If (%ClipboardText% Contains Alcoholic Beverages, Ignore case: ON) ​Line 17: Send keys (Foreground window) \rightarrow {Control}(w) ​Line 18: Wait \rightarrow 0.5 seconds ​Line 19: Next loop ​Line 20: End ​Line 21: Send keys (UI element: Word document) \rightarrow {Control}(v){Return} ​Line 22: Focus window (Window class: Chrome_WidgetWin_1) ​Line 23: Send keys (Foreground window) \rightarrow {Control}(w) ​Line 24: Wait \rightarrow 0.5 seconds ​Line 25: End (Loop) this is my current set up