Automate Office365: Send a daily PDF report via email then archive it

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We are going to describe in here an automation idea that can be build in Studio Web with the help of UiPath.MicrosoftOffice365.Activities.
There are never too many automation ideas, and this automation workflow can be built even by those new to RPA.

Context: What mundane task are we to automate?

The example brings in the context Alejandra, a project manager in a large company.
At the end of each working day, she has to send a report to the stakeholders with details about the status of the project, timesheets, etc. During the day, the team members are entering the required information in a Excel file stored in SharePoint Online.

Every evening, Alejandra connects from home to her work computer and does the following steps manually:

  • Archives the Excel daily report by copying it to a special folder.
  • Downloads the archived Excel report file.
  • Open the file in Excel and save it as PDF.
  • Attaches the PDF report to the email that she then sends to the stakeholders.

Because of her very busy schedule, at work and at home, sometimes she forgets to send the report. The customer is very rigorous about receiving it daily. Alejandra should find a way to make sure the customer gets what they need, in time. Reliability builds trust, and without it, you cannot have a great relationship.

Alejandra has just heard about UiPath Studio Web and she wants to try creating a workflow that will automate this daily task. If it works, there will be one less thing to worry about!

Automation steps

Step 1 - Copy today’s report file to the archive folder

To archive the daily report file, Alejandra uses Copy File/Folder activity from the Microsoft Office 365 package to copy the Excel file to the archive folder. She sets a new name for the archived file that includes the current date, like “Daily Report - 2022-01-09.xlsx”. Finally, Alejandra gives a suggestive name for the value that represents a reference to the copied file which she will use later.

1. Copy File
1. Copy File732Ă—685 35.3 KB

Step 2 - Download today’s report as a PDF file

This is where she uses the Download File activity from the Microsoft Office 365 package to download locally the archived daily report as a PDF file. To achieve this, Alejandra has to set the value for Convert to PDF format field to True. She saves the output of this activity as pdfDailyReport value.

2. Download File
2. Download File731Ă—635 26.5 KB

Step 3 - Send the PDF file to stakeholders

Finally, Alejandra uses Send Email activity from the Microsoft Office 365 package to send the PDF report file to the stakeholders. To attach the file, she adds the pdfDailyReport value via the collection builder in Attachments field. She also sets the importance of the email to High.

When Alejandra tests the workflow, she makes sure that Save as draft is set to True. When everything works fine she will set it to False.

That was all! Using just three activities she was able to implement a workflow that it will save her precious time and make the client happy. She can publish now the project to Orchestrator and schedule it to run every evening of the work week.

3. Send Email
3. Send Email577Ă—640 30 KB

Let us know what you think of this automation idea! Would you like us to share more of these?

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