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Comment by kilimchoi | Hacker News Reader

sounds like RPA

I've been conflicted about RPA because my view is that if there's an API, you should use that rather than comparatively brittle screen-based "integration". What's extremely compelling about this approach though is that you can cut through all of the friction of API's - even end users understand how to use the UI so they're really empowered to build their own automation in a way that they haven't been previously.

80-90% of what I do doesn't have an API. If there's an API that's functional enough you're darn straight I'm going to be using that vs. Puppeteer, etc!

Most big business use older software, and the small amount of it that does have an API often does not work correctly or is stable. Sad but true. I've ran into a lot of instances where people automate through the GUI because it is the best option. Developers don't realize this because they don't like working with older technology.

Also, at large orgs, software updates can take _forever_. I know of some examples where updating to the newer version of a B2B software taking 7+ years.

And a lot of those automations will need things like OCR or NLP. Even just out of the box Excel integration is a huge time saver. UiPath has activities built in for that. It's more than just GUI interaction. There's a ton of partner technology with out of the box integrations, and you get frameworks to build your automations on, as well as all of the infrastructure and orchestration.

Disclaimer: I work at UiPath

I was going to say. Many companies are already investing heavily in RPA (Robotic Process Automation) these days. It’s not widely known in tech circles but kind of common knowledge in traditional companies trying to automate tedious workflow tasks.

When I first saw it, I thought: this looks like a glorified Autohotkey or Automator. But companies like UiPath are doing very well selling this type of automation software.

It sounds mundane but for a company with lots of entry level staff, the paybacks are appreciable.

Coupled with cloud based OCR as a service offerings etc. a lot of data entry tasks can be automated.

> Autohotkey

Yep I've had to employ this software to get things done before. Also OCR doesn't need a cloud vs. a beefy computer - I do a lot of that too.

Yes free OCR software itself is pretty simple and can run offline but if your accuracy requirements are high (for critical documents), different algorithms (typically proprietary) are needed and as well as fallbacks to contracted human labor for verification. At some level it makes sense to outsource to a cloud provider.

> OCR doesn't need a cloud vs. a beefy computer - I do a lot of that too.

Can you elaborate on this?

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