topic RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode in Product Forum

Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

david.l.morris — Thu, 05 Nov 2020 22:44:00 GMT

Hi Everyone,

I want to make sure this is actually a bug before I report it as such. As of this week (potentially with the recent update to the browser extension), I've found that Blue Prism 6.9 has issues with spying Chrome elements in Browser Mode after you open a new tab. I should mention that, for what I'm describing, I've tested this on a Virtual Machine as well as locally on my own computer, and the behavior is the same. In both of these environments, the behavior was different, let's say, a month ago or so, but I hadn't tested this frequently recently until this week.

I'm actually noticing a couple of issues, but I think one of them may already be known due to an issue with the ephemoral ports setting. I'm not sure if it's related or not. So, what I'm describing I found to be the case whether that setting is on or off.

If I use Blue Prism 6.9 to launch Chrome with a Starting URL, it (usually) attaches correctly and the HTML elements are spyable using Browser Mode. But if Blue Prism or even if I manually click a link that triggers the next web page to open in a new tab or I just open a new tab and navigate to another webpage, the elements are not spyable in that new tab.

There are a couple things you may consider suggesting based on this (and you'd be right to suggest them as possibilities), so let me head off a couple of them that I am aware of already. First, I do not think this has to do with whether the ephemoral port setting is on or off. I did only a little bit of testing with each, but it does appear to behave this way consistently regardless of that setting. Second, it isn't (or at least shouldn't be) an issue with Chrome generating new Windows processes for new tabs. I say it shouldn't be because we have an existing automation that worked in 6.7, 6.8, and 6.9 (before the most recent update to the Chrome extension) including using elements in the new tab. Granted, in 6.9, it worked slow due to the slowness issue. Now that the extension has been updated, it's no longer slow, but it cannot identify elements in new tabs.

Let me know if anyone has run into this as well and whether you found a workaround. I haven't found a workaround just yet, but I'll be looking into it again tomorrow.

Thanks!

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Dave Morris
Cano Ai
Atlanta, GA
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

FedericoMignone — Fri, 06 Nov 2020 15:05:00 GMT

Hi Dave, i want ask you, did you never had trouble spying elements in chrome? Because when I launch the app, the Application Modeller doesnt recognice any element in the window.

Thank you in advance!

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Federico Mignone
EY - Ernst And Young
Buenos Aires
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

david.l.morris — Fri, 06 Nov 2020 15:36:00 GMT

Normally works for me. There are some versions of Blue Prism that are less stable than others regarding Chrome automation though. The only thing that should be required is having the Blue Prism extension installed in Chrome for at least Browser mode to work.

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Dave Morris
Cano Ai
Atlanta, GA
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Fri, 06 Nov 2020 16:04:00 GMT

Hi Dave,

I spotted this and took the liberty of having the team run a few tests to check your findings. We've been unable to replicate the issue that you report when using fixed ports for browser extension communications, but we have spotted the same behaviour that you describe above when using ephemeral ports. The developers are taking a look at the previous version of the extension to locate the source of the issue now.

Can I ask whether you restarted your runtime resources between changes to the browser extension port setting? I was thinking that if you were using ephemeral ports to begin with and adjusted the system setting without restarting your resources the same behaviour may appear to persist, but that's only because the resource would recognise the change in system setting next time it started up.

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

david.l.morris — Fri, 06 Nov 2020 16:34:00 GMT

Hi Rob,

My fault. I thought 'restart the runtime resources' meant to restart the RR process and not the entire RR machine. Of course, I also only did a small bit of testing with the ephemeral ports setting. In any case, yeah I was wrong about that.

I just did some more testing and had the same results as you described, when I restart the machine between fixed/ephemeral port setting changes. I'm able to spy elements in new tabs while using fixed ports (System setting checked) and cannot spy in new tabs while using ephemeral ports (System setting unchecked).

I'll look into whether we can switch back to fixed port temporarily, but we'll definitely want to switch back if you guys are able to resolve the issue. I am curious as well as to whether this issue was introduced with the most recent update to the browser extension. It'd help me know that I'm not crazy and that spying in a new tab did work about 2 weeks ago, but I'm just not 100% sure.

Thanks for looking into this!

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Dave Morris
Cano Ai
Atlanta, GA
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Mon, 09 Nov 2020 16:33:00 GMT

Hi Dave,

We've identified the source of the issue that you have described and a new version of the browser extension is now working it's way through our internal regression testing for each of the browsers that we support (Chrome, Edge Chromium and Firefox). This should hopefully be completed in the next few days and we'll push a new version of the extension to each of the respective browser stores.

I'll post further updates when I have more information on timings.

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

david.l.morris — Mon, 09 Nov 2020 17:08:00 GMT

Thanks, Rob! If I come across things like this in the future, what's actually the best way to give information to you guys? Email to support, forum/community post like this, an idea in the Idea Portal, send through our Partner rep/manager, or other?

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Dave Morris
Cano Ai
Atlanta, GA
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Tue, 10 Nov 2020 12:23:00 GMT

Hi Dave,

Reporting issues like this to customer support would probably be the best way of getting this feedback through to us, unless you would be interested in signing up for our new User Research Program, part of which is an early access initiative which can see qualifying customers get early access to the product (before general release) to evaluate new features and functionality.

If this would be of interest I believe you can sign up for the research program by going to the "Get involved" menu and selecting "User Research Program".

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

david.l.morris — Tue, 10 Nov 2020 17:18:00 GMT

Yeah I filled out the User Research Program questionnaire on October 23rd. I'm down to sign up for whatever gives me the quickest way to report issues, especially whatever makes it easiest for you guys to intake the information.

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Dave Morris
Cano Ai
Atlanta, GA
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

dcternes — Wed, 11 Nov 2020 01:55:00 GMT

I think it's absolutely brilliant that this post led to that action led to this solution - and in such a timely fashion. It's an excellent advertisement for the Communities. Kudos to Dave and Robert!

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Dan Ternes
CTO APJ
Blue Prism
Asia/Hong_Kong
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

travis.brown — Wed, 11 Nov 2020 15:49:00 GMT

Hi Rob,

I am having the same issue. Will the update to the extension be applied automatically or will we have to update manually?

Thanks,
Travis

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Travis Brown
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Wed, 11 Nov 2020 16:16:00 GMT

Hi Travis,

You should receive the update automatically - the way we deploy our Chrome and Edge Chromium extensions mean that when an updated version is published to the store any users of the extension should pull down the update immediately (unless measures have been taken to disable the automatic download of extensions from the Chrome/Edge stores).

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

travis.brown — Thu, 12 Nov 2020 14:31:00 GMT

Hi Rob,

Thanks. Are you able to advise how far away from a fix you are? Are you also able to come back on this thread once the said fix has been deployed?

Thanks,
Travis

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Travis Brown
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Fri, 13 Nov 2020 17:10:00 GMT

Hi Travis,

Apologies for the delay, I didn't want to reply before I had a firm answer for you.

Our regression testing is now complete and I'm happy to confirm that the new version of the Chrome extension will be published to the Chrome store Monday morning (I would estimate between 8-9am UK time). We will be uploading the Edge and Firefox extensions on Monday morning as well, but I'm afraid I can't estimate when the review process on each of the stores will be complete. Past experience has shown Firefox to normally be quite quick, around a couple of hours, but the review of an upload to the Microsoft Edge store can take anywhere from a 1-3 days (though I can't guarantee it wouldn't be longer!).

I hope this helps.

Regards,

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

MK — Sun, 15 Nov 2020 14:14:00 GMT

Hi,
I'm facing this issue of not able to spy Chrome elements in Browser Mode. I switched to Firfox but for Firefox the elements are not even getting highlighted in browser mode. Please advise.

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M K
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Mon, 16 Nov 2020 09:37:00 GMT

Hello M K,

I believe the issue you are describing is different than the one being discussed in this thread. This issue is specifically related to a new tab being opened within an existing browser instance in which Blue Prism is able to spy elements and finding that the new tab cannot be spied - I may be wrong, but your issue sounds like you can't spy Chrome at all.

I believe I've seen some other threads in which topics like this have been discussed, one such thread can be found here:
https://community.blueprism.com/communities/community-home/digestviewer/viewthread?GroupId=145&MessageKey=f0d773da-afd5-44d8-9d21-f121ee87b9b4&CommunityKey=3743dbaa-6766-4a4d-b7ed-9a98b6b1dd01&tab=digestviewer&ReturnUrl=%2fcommunities%2fcommunity-home%2fdigestviewer%3fCommunityKey%3d3743dbaa-6766-4a4d-b7ed-9a98b6b1dd01

I'd suggest giving the existing discussion points a read and, if none of the suggested mitigations work for you, raising a support ticket so that we can investigate your problems more thoroughly.

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Mon, 16 Nov 2020 09:39:00 GMT

Hi Travis (and Dave),

I can confirm that the new version of the Chrome extension is now live on the Chrome store. The new versions of the extension for Microsoft Edge Chromium and Firefox are now also working their way through the review process on the respective stores.

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Tue, 17 Nov 2020 16:52:00 GMT

Hello all,

Earlier today we identified a degradation of performance impacting browser automations for Chrome, Firefox and Edge. After further investigation, it has been identified that the recent patch made available yesterday, 16th November, to the browser extension has inadvertently introduced a performance issue.

As a result, we have reverted to the previous version of the extension with an updated version number of 2.2.0.6 for Chrome and Firefox to stabilise performance whilst we look to resolve the issue reported in this thread without impacting performance of the extension. The new version of the extension for the Edge store was still in review, so we have cancelled the publishing of this to leave the extension available on the Edge store fixed at the current version number of 2.2.0.3.

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

MohammadSiddiqu — Thu, 19 Nov 2020 12:24:00 GMT

I am also getting this issue when i am redirecting to a different page. The chrome browser gets disconnected. Will this also be resolved with the updated extension?

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Mohammad Siddique
Senior Consultant
Allstate
Asia/Kolkata
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RE: Chrome in BP 6.9 -- New Tab not spyable in Browser Mode

robert.nicklin — Thu, 19 Nov 2020 12:35:00 GMT

Hi Mohammad,

Your issue sounds slightly different to the one mentioned in this thread - while I'd be happy to hear more about what steps you've taken to see this occur I'd suggest raising a support ticket as this may be a more appropriate route to diagnose your issue. There may also be some workarounds/changes to settings that support could advise you on to help in the meantime while they investigate your issue.

Regards,
Rob

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Robert Nicklin
Senior Product Owner
Blue Prism
Warrington, England
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