Release date: 26 April 2021

What’s New

64-bit MSI Installer

• UiPathStudio.msi is now a 64-bit installer. A 32-bit version (UiPathStudio-x86.msi) is also available and can only be installed on 32-bit operating systems.
  Important: Use the 64-bit MSI installer to update your existing 32-bit Studio installations on 64-bit operating systems.
• To make it easier for you to configure the installation, the UiPathStudio.msi installation wizard has a new and improved user interface, and better defaults for each installation scenario (Studio, Assistant, or Unattended Robot).
• You can now install the SAP Solution Manager Plugin for Studio Pro as part of the installation from both the installation wizard and the command line.

Goodbye, Platform Installer

• This new release brings about the UiPathPlatformInstaller.exe deprecation, so you can no longer install or upgrade Studio and Robot along with Orchestrator using the same installer.
  While we continue to offer support for previous versions of the UiPlatformInstaller.exe installer, performing a v2021.4 Studio and Robot installation or upgrade is now possible only via the UiPathStudio.msi installer.
  No action is required on your part if you previously used the UiPlatformInstaller.exe installer. However, if you decide to uninstall UiPathPlatformInstaller.exe, make sure to double-check which installer you are removing.

Automatic Updates for the Community Edition

• If you install Studio using with the Community Edition EXE installer and activate it with an Enterprise license, Studio will now automatically update to the latest Stable release whenever a new version is released.
  In addition, if an automatic update to the latest release takes place while you have a project open, you are now informed of the update by a message and a progress bar displayed in the status bar.

Requirements Updates

• The x64 version of Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Redistributable Update 3 is now required for GIT source control integration on 64-bit operating systems.

Studio Is Now Based on .NET 5

• Studio has migrated from .NET Framework 4.6.1 to .NET 5. This brings improvements in terms of performance, stability, and security. This change does not impact projects, which continue to target .NET Framework 4.6.1.

Governance through Automation Ops

• Studio can now be governed through Automation Ops, a new web-based application available in Automation Cloud that offers an easy way to define and deploy governance policies across the organization.

New Ribbon and Home Tab Shortcuts

• New keyboard shortcuts for quick navigation through the options in the Home tab (Studio Backstage View) and the Studio ribbon are available after you press the Alt key.

Support for Undo / Redo

• You can now undo / redo actions in the Designer panel using the corresponding buttons in the Studio ribbon, as well as the Ctrl + Z / Ctrl + Y keyboard shortcuts.

Better Experience of Managing Validation Errors

• We've made it easier to identify and manage validation errors in your activities:
  • In the Designer panel, an error icon is now displayed for any activity and activity field with validation errors, and a warning icon is displayed for all the parent activities of an activity with validation errors. In addition, clicking the icons now opens the Properties panel for the activity affected by the issue.
  • In the Properties panel, all validation error messages are now displayed at the top of the panel, and the error icon is displayed for all properties with errors.

Refresh Remote Git Branches

• We've added Git fetch functionality that enables you to refresh the list of Git remote branches and remove references that no longer exist on the remote. A Refresh remote branches option is now available in the status bar branch menu as well as the Manage Branches window.

New Application Icon

• Studio has a brand new icon, we hope you'll like it!

Improvements

Object Repository

• Dragging a screen from the Object Repository and dropping it in the Designer panel automatically adds a Use Application/Browser activity to the workflow.
• Four new element types are available in the Type field of the Add Element and Edit Element windows:
  • Column Name and Row Name under the Informational Components category
  • Text and Cell under the Input Controls category
• It is now easier to use Capture Elements to record missing elements and modify existing elements for applications and screens that have already been added to the Object Repository. When you right-click an existing application or screen and select Capture Elements, the Capture Elements recorder is now pre-populated with all the objects that are already configured for that application or screen.
• You can now manually create a new element in the Capture Elements recorder. This enables you to easily group and rearrange elements inside the recorder by dragging and dropping them as children of newly created elements.
• The dropdown in the Type field of the Add Element and Edit Element windows now has a Recent section at the top of menu that lists the five most recently used element types.
• You can now indicate or edit a descriptor directly from the Options menu in activities that already reference a descriptor.

Source Control

• You can now add a new folder in the TFS and SVN repository browsers using the Create Folder button above the left navigation pane.
• The Project Dependencies Mass Update Tool can update projects stored in GIT repositories.

Publishing Projects

• You can now define a custom icon for the package created when you publish a process or a library.
• We've simplified the list of Publish to options that are available in the Publish Process window when working with Orchestrator folders with separate package feeds:
  • If a folder or a subfolder from a hierarchy with a separate package feed is selected in Studio, the feed for that folder hierarchy is the default Publish to option, and no other folder with a separate package feed is available for selection.
  • If the folder selected in Studio is not a folder with a separate package feed or one of its subfolders, only the default Orchestrator Tenant Processes Feed, Orchestrator Personal Workspace Feed (if applicable), and Custom options are available.

Usability

• You can now remove unused resources from your projects from a single location. Select Remove Unused from the Studio ribbon, and then select what to remove: Variables, Workflows, Arguments, Dependencies, Imports, or Screenshots.
• The Add activity search bar no longer lists duplicate entries for recently used activities. If an activity was used recently, it now appears only as a Recent entry at the top of the list.
• To simplify automation design, all required input and output properties are now available in the body of the activity in the Designer panel, even for activities that are built to display the fields only in the Properties panel. This also applies to properties of activities from installed libraries if the arguments are marked as required in the library project.
• When you drag an Orchestrator resource from the Resources panel and drop it in the Designer panel, after you select the compatible activity to add (for example, Invoke Process, Run Parallel Process, or Start Job for processes), the Folder Path activity property is now automatically populated with the Orchestrator folder where the resource resides.
• If an error occurs when you try to sign in to your account, the error message now includes a link to a page that documents possible causes and solutions for frequently encountered sign-in errors.

Other Improvements

• You can now specify a custom location for the RuleConfig.json when running the Workflow Analyzer from the command line.
• You can now use the Run from this Activity and Test Activity features for activities that require a scope. This does not apply to activities added inside the following containers: Try Catch, Switch, Parallel, Pick, Trigger Scope, and Retry Scope.

Improvements in Studio Pro

Mock Testing

• Any changes made in the workflow are now automatically synchronized and reflected in the mock file.
• When creating test cases, you can select a mock from existing mock files.
• The hash of the original workflow is now stored in the mock information folder.

Coverage Panel

• The progress bar has a fresh look, in tune with the Studio style.
• When debugging your test case, you can examine the activities that have been covered during the test run.
• Activity coverage now shows test run status and result.

Data-Driven Testing

• When creating test cases, you can add test data to import data sets.
• When adding test data you can select which columns and rows to import from your data set.
• Now you can update your test data from Studio if you have made any changes to the data source.

Test Manager Integration

• When you assign automation to test cases, you can also assign it to existing requirements.
• Create new test case entries in Test Manager when assigning automation.
• Save time by linking multiple test cases to a requirement.
• When a test case is deleted from a Studio project, the linked test case in Test Manager is automatically unlinked.
• Any test case name changes in Studio are now synchronized to the automation information in Test Manager.
• You can log in to Test Manager using Studio credentials. For more information, see Integrating with Studio.
• When configuring the Test Manager integration for a project in Studio, a list of recently used URLs is provided for your convenience.
• Assigning an automation to a test case in Test Manager, now overwrites any previous assignment.
• Improved error message for deleting test case entries manually from the configuration file.
• We have improved the synchronization time between Studio and Test Manager when performing actions such as deleting test case or unlinking automation.

Breaking Changes

🚧

Important:

When upgrading from older versions to v2021.4 on 64-bit OS, the installation files are moved from C:\Program Files (x86) to C:\Program Files, unless a custom installation folder is used. This change can affect scripts using hardcoded paths. Make sure to review them before use.

• If Studio was configured to use the default location for custom Workflow Analyzer rules in a previous version on a 64-bit operating system (C:\Program Files (x86)\UiPath\Studio\Rules) the rules are not moved to the new default location (C:\Program Files\UiPath\Studio\Rules) when Studio is updated to v2021.4. To keep your custom rules:
  1. Prior to updating, move the rules to a different folder.
  2. After updating, go to Home (Studio Backstage View) > Settings > Locations and set the folder as the Custom Workflow Analyzer rules location.

Known Issues

• When you use GIT Init to add the current project to a GIT repository and a default branch is set in both the global gitconfig file (C:\users%username%\.gitconfig) and the system gitconfig file (C:\Program Files\Git\etc\.gitconfig), Studio uses the default branch value from the global file instead of the one from the system file.
• If the Output, Error List, Find References, or Breakpoints panel is not pinned and it covers a large area of the window while Studio is maximized, clicking the Restore button in the status bar to make Studio smaller can cause the panel to cover almost the entire window and Studio not to display properly. To correct the issue, minimize and then restore Studio from the Windows taskbar, or minimize and then restore the panel in Studio.
• Because the namespace of several System activities has changed after version 19.4, if you added one of the affected activities to the list of Favorites using version 19.4 or earlier of the System activities package, the activities no longer appear in the Favorites list when you update the package to a version after 19.4. The available workaround is to add the activities to the Favorites list again.
  The activities with a changed namespace are: Log Message, Filter Data Table, Message Box, File Change Trigger, Invoke Code, Retry Scope, Do While, and While.
• Studio cannot load entities imported from the Data Service in projects stored on network drives. As a workaround, move projects that contain entities to the local machine.
• When working in Windows 8 or Windows Server 2012, Studio can become unresponsive if you use the Ctrl + N keyboard shortcut to open the New Sequence dialog. As a workaround, hover over the Studio icon in the Windows taskbar to expose all Studio windows, and then close the New Sequence dialog. To create a new sequence, instead of using the keyboard shortcut, select New > Sequence in the Studio ribbon.
• When you publish a project to a custom URL that becomes unavailable while the Info dialog box at the end of the publishing process is open, if you click the Location link in the dialog box, it can take longer than expected (over 1 minute) for an error to be displayed and inform you that the location cannot be found.
• If a process contains an activity from a library and Environment.CurrentDirectory is set in that activity, the current directory of the process changes to the current directory of the library.

In Studio Pro

• Renaming a Studio Pro test project that includes test cases causes an error when publishing the tests.
• Design time and runtime performance of C# projects is lower when compared to VB.NET. When runtime performance is essential, we recommend using VB.NET instead of C#. We plan to update the speed related to C# with future updates.

Bug Fixes

• Execution no longer gets stuck when you debug a file or a project that contains Pick and Pick Branch activities with both Slow Step and Execution Trail enabled.
• Studio no longer becomes unresponsive during debugging when you double-click a value from a DataTable variable in the Locals panel and that DataTable contains multiple empty rows between the first and last values.
• The Activity Name Defaults (ST-MRD-002) Workflow Analyzer rule is now applied correctly on localized activities that are not part of a dependency package.
• When using the uipath.policy.governancepolicy or uipath.policy.governancesource Orchestrator assets to enforce governance policies, deploying a separate governance policy to a user by adding a specific value for that user now works as expected.
  Erratum 15 June 2021: This issue has been fixed only for Automation Cloud Orchestrator. Setting per-user values still does not work when using On-Premises Orchestrator.
• We've fixed several issues related to creating automations over a Remote Desktop Connection:
  • Clicking the title bar of an activity in the Designer panel in order to rename it no longer zooms in to the activity in the workflow.
  • The Variables panel is no longer slow to load when selected.
  • Studio controls are now properly displayed and the Studio window does not lose focus when you open Studio and then connect to the machine using Remote Desktop multiple times.
  • An enumerator is not valid error no longer occurs if you open Studio over a Remote Desktop Connection, then leave the machine idle for an extended period of time (for example, a few days), and then reconnect to the machine using Remote Desktop.
  • Issues no longer occur if you use Studio over a Remote Desktop Connection for an extended period of time.
• Workflows that contain activities from a custom library no longer take a long time to perform the validation at the beginning of execution. This applies as long as libraries are published with the Compile activities expressions option enabled.
• A library compilation error no longer occurs when you try to publish a library created in a previous version of Studio that contains a Try Catch activity which catches a System.ServiceModel.CommunicationException exception. The issue occurred for libraries created in Studio versions starting with 2019.10.5.
• Publishing libraries now works as expected regardless of the project folder structure.
• Fixed an issue that was preventing certain SOAP web services from being added to libraries with an error stating the document is incorrect when using a link, or failing to compile the services with an error stating variable types do not exist when using a file.
• Fixed an issue which caused Studio to fail to add netstandard.dll as a dependency when using a variable or argument type that required it in a project. This fix applies only to projects created in Studio v2021.4. For projects created in previous versions of Studio, change the type of the variable or argument, and then change it back to the original type