Abstract
Process automation typically begins with the observation of humans conducting the tasks that will be eventually automated. Similarly, successful RPA projects require a prior analysis of the undergoing processes which are being executed by humans. The process of collecting this type of information is known as user interface (UI) logging since it records the interaction against a UI. Main RPA platforms (e.g., Blueprism and UIPath) incorporate functionalities that allow the recording of these UI interactions. However, the records that these platforms generate lack some functionalities that large-scale RPA projects require. Besides, they are only understandable by the proper RPA platforms. This paper presents an extensible and multi-platform OpenSource UI logger that generate UI logs in a standard format. This system collects information from all the computers it is running on and sends it to a central server for its processing. Treatment of the collected information will allow the creation of an enriched UI log which can be used, among others purposes, for smart process analysis, machine learning training, the creation of RPA robots, or, being more general, for task mining .
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Aguirre, S., Rodriguez, A.: Automation of a business process using robotic process automation (RPA): a case study. In: Figueroa-García, J.C., López-Santana, E.R., Villa-Ramírez, J.L., Ferro-Escobar, R. (eds.) WEA 2017. CCIS, vol. 742, pp. 65–71. Springer, Cham (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-66963-2_7
Automation Anywhere. Automation Anywhere: Global RPA Solutions (2020). www.automationanywhere.com. Accessed June 2020
Bayldon, J.: SharpRPA, a free and open-source RPA solution powered by the.net framework. http://www.taskt.net/. Accessed May 2020
Bestxsoftware. Best free keylogger. https://bestxsoftware.com/es/. Accessed May 2020
Blue Prism. Blue prism, intelligent RPA platform (2020). www.blueprism.com. Accessed June 2020
Dumais, S., Jeffries, R., Russell, D.M., Tang, D., Teevan, J.: Understanding user behavior through log data and analysis. In: Olson, J.S., Kellogg, W.A. (eds.) Ways of Knowing in HCI, pp. 349–372. Springer, New York (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-0378-8_14
Enríquez, J.G., Jiménez-Ramírez, A., Domínguez-Mayo, F.J., García-García, J.A.: Robotic process automation: a scientific and industrial systematic mapping study. IEEE Access 8, 39113–39129 (2020)
Fung, H.P.: Criteria, use cases and effects of information technology process automation (ITPA). Adv. Robot. Autom. 3(3), 1–10 (2014)
Geyer-Klingeberg, J., Nakladal, J., Baldauf, F., Veit, F.: Process mining and robotic process automation: a perfect match. In: International Conference on Business Process Management, pp. 1–8 (2018)
Gusfield, D.: Algorithms on Strings, Trees, and Sequences: Computer Science and Computational Biology. Cambridge University Press, New York (1999)
Jimenez-Ramirez, A., Reijers, H.A., Barba, I., Del Valle, C.: A method to improve the early stages of the robotic process automation lifecycle. In: Giorgini, P., Weber, B. (eds.) CAiSE 2019. LNCS, vol. 11483, pp. 446–461. Springer, Cham (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-21290-2_28
Leno, V., Polyvyanyy, A., Dumas, M., La Rosa, M., Maggi, F.M.: Robotic process mining: vision and challenges. Bus. Inf. Syst. Eng. 1–14 (2020)
Leno, V., Polyvyanyy, A., La Rosa, M., Dumas, M., Maggi, F.M.: Action logger: enabling process mining for robotic process automation. In: Proceedings of the Dissertation Award, Doctoral Consortium, and Demonstration Track at 17th International Conference on Business Process Management (BPM 2019), Vienna, Austria, pp. 124–128 (2019)
OpenRPA. Open source robotic process automation software (2020). https://openrpa.openrpa.dk/. Accessed June 2020
Randhawa, A.: Blackcat keylogger. https://github.com/ajayrandhawa/Keylogger. Accessed May 2020
Reinkemeyer, L.: Process Mining in Action. Principles, Use Cases and Outlook. Springer, Heidelberg (2020)
Singh, S.: Optical character recognition techniques: a survey. J. Emerg. Trends Comput. Inf. Sci. 4(6), 545–550 (2013)
Spyrix Inc.: Spyrix. parental & employees monitoring software. http://www.spyrix.com/. Accessed May 2020
Spytech Software and Design, Inc.: Spytech, providing computer monitoring solutions since 1998. https://www.spytech-web.com/spyagent.shtml. Accessed May 2020
Taulli, T.: Open source RPA. The Robotic Process Automation Handbook, pp. 259–272. Apress, Berkeley, CA (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4842-5729-6_11
UiPath. The UiPath Activities Guide (2020). https://docs.uipath.com/activities. Accessed June 2020
UiPath. UiPath enterprise RPA platform, where the future of RPA arrives first (2020). www.uipath.com. Accessed June 2020
UiPath. UiPath recording types (2020). http://docs.uipath.com/studio/docs/about-recording-types. Accessed June 2020
Aalst, W.: Data science in action. Process Mining, pp. 3–23. Springer, Heidelberg (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-49851-4_1
Willcocks, L., Lacity, M., Craig, A.: Robotic process automation: strategic transformation lever for global business services? J. Inf. Technol. Teach. Cases 7(1), 17–28 (2017)
Wong, C., Bern, M.W., Goldberg, D.: An image signature for any kind of image. In: International Conference on Image Processing, pp. 409–412 (2002)
Acknowledgements
This research has been supported by the Pololas project (TIN2016-76956-C3-2-R) of the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, the Trop@ project (CEI-12-TIC021) of the Junta de Andalucía, and the AIRPA (P011-19/E09) project of the Centro para el Desarrollo Tecnológico Industrial (CDTI) of Spain.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2020 Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this paper
Cite this paper
López-Carnicer, J.M., del Valle, C., Enríquez, J.G. (2020). Towards an OpenSource Logger for the Analysis of RPA Projects. In: Asatiani, A., et al. Business Process Management: Blockchain and Robotic Process Automation Forum. BPM 2020. Lecture Notes in Business Information Processing, vol 393. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58779-6_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-58779-6_12
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-58778-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-58779-6
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)