There is the magic again ;)

In this blogpost I will show you the great magic and potential of Artificial Intelligence (AI). This time it's there in automation flows helping us building PowerAutomate Cloud flows by using Natural language.

Extracting data from documents via OCR scanning and Azure Cognitive Services, recognizing images through AI object detection. Or performing a sentiment analysis when phrases are send by customers through a chatbot and informing line managers when needed.

AI is and will be over the place, helping us in our daily jobs being CitizenDevelopers. Non-IT trained employees with a passion for no- and low-code technologies empowering them in their day2day tasks.

You're right there's the PowerPlatform again making a fine blend with MS Azure and AI.

Let's take a closer look at building PowerAutomate Cloud flows by using AI and Natural Language processing thanks to the OpenAI Codex. The option is currently in preview and a Dataverse environment in the US is a prerequisite.

Within the PowerAutomate environment (make.powerautomate.com) you will see appearing the option 'You describe it, AI builds it.

Provided texts will be processed by AI and present you a possible Cloud flows with trigger and actions. Let's try this out!

Start by entering your phrase in the provided description field. You will see that suggested flow description will appear.

Ok let's take following example: 'Send me an email meaasge when a file is added to SharePoint. Here is where the AI magic starts.

A Cloud flow will be suggested where SharePoint is the trigger and where 2 following actions are proposed.

Click on the little eye icon to see the different trigger & actions.

Select the suggested flow and click on the Next button. You will be shown the connected apps and services and if all green checks let's go for it in building the workflow. A wizard will guide you further in the setup.

Click on the Create flow button to proceed.

And there is where the magic flow again. The workflow has been created automatically for you and ready to be optimized. Add some expressions, some dynamics fields or variables and you're ready to go.

Ok, perhaps another one. Starting from a new response being submitted in a MS Forms, creating a task and posting a message in a Teams channel. There it is!

And the workflow being build...

And there it is ;), the magic happens.

Wrapping things up. Will this AI functionality create the most complex workflows? Probably not (at this moment). Also have a look at the current limitations.

But I'm convinced that this AI functionality will help Citizen Developers in their PowerPlatform learning journey. Business language being translated into technology solutions. Great no?

Wishing you all some wonderful times with your family during this Christmas period!

Kind regards,

Frank Vanhamel

PowerPlatform Evangelist