I am learning RPA using tools such as UiPath and BluePrism. Can someone explain me what is surface automation(SA) techniques in RPA or direct me to the path where i can read more regarding SA techniques?
How does surface automation help in automating flash objects used in website ?
Thanks, vds1
Surface automation in RPA means the process of creating automation according to images shown on a screen.
Surface automation is notoriously fragile and should be considered as a secondary method after programmatic solutions.
Surface automation is useful at least in two cases: when you can’t use controls programmatically (e.g. by element identifiers), or when the system under automation is changing (e.g. element identifiers are changing). It can also be faster than ’normal’ scripting.
In case of flash objects used in website, surface automation might be needed if there is no programmatic way to control or extract data from the object.
Surface automation techniques, such as optical character recognition (OCR) and object detection, are based on broader class of computer vision: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_vision