‘Download CR file’ action is part of the ‘File’ package. Using this action, you can download a file from the Control Room to the bot runner machine.
This action is very useful when you want a specific file to be downloaded to the bot runner before executing the bot.
For Ex:
- A config file is bundled as part of the bot downloaded from the Bot Store, and the file needs to be in the local device, as the bot updates the file during the execution.
- A template file needs to be downloaded from the Control room and then generate a letter for each customer with his information.
This action consists of 3 parameters to be configured.
Select a Control Room file: Here, you will specify the file in the Control Room which needs to be downloaded.
In the ‘Find a File’ modal:
- Select ‘Search’ tab, if you want to search for a specific file by typing the file name
- Select ‘Browser’ to navigate to a specific file through the folder structure
- Select 'Upload', if you want to upload a file to a specific folder in CR and then select the same file to be downloaded
Save CR file to location: Here, you will mention the folder path where the file from CR needs to be downloaded. The folder path does accept variables, so the path can be dynamic based on the variable value during the current transaction.
Overwrite existing file: Here you can specify if you would like the existing file in the bot runner to be overwritten by the file from the Control Room. You can hard code the value as True or False or you can also set a variable to get the boolean value based on defined conditions. 
Let’s learn how to use this action with a use case.
"A support executive receives an Excel spreadsheet with a list of customers with all their information to apply for a credit card. He is expected to create a letter for each customer. To maintain uniformity across all the letters generated, we will use a template file (CreditCardApplication_Template.docx). This template file is provided to you as part of the bot file shared below. Now let’s achieve this task using ‘Download CR file’ following by looping through each row in Excel and creating a letter for each customer and updating the information related to him."
Packages used:
MS Word (Download from Bot Store)
System variables package (Download from Bot Store)
Conclusion:
Use the action ‘Download CR file’ whenever you have to include any files (that need to be downloaded) along with a bot. Vendors/developers who submit bots to Bot store should use this action to download any of their config files before the bot executes in the end-user machine. It improves the user experience during the first bot run and whenever it needs a template file for further processing as seen in the above use case.
You can download the bot code and the supporting files from here
To learn about Excel advanced package, please visit this page