Excel and Email Automation
Excel
Two families exist. Excel Application Scope (interop) drives a real Excel instance: full feature support, macros, pivot tables and formulas, but it requires Excel installed and a licence. The Workbook (System) activities read and write the file directly without Excel, which is faster and server-friendly but does not execute macros or support every feature. The modern design experience replaces the scope with Use Excel File plus an Excel Process Scope that controls process reuse, visibility and whether existing files are saved.
Typical flow: Read Range into a DataTable, transform in memory with Filter Data Table or LINQ, then Write Range or Append Range back. Always close the workbook; leaked Excel processes lock the file.
Outlook activities use the locally installed Outlook profile (Outlook must be running for desktop automations) with Get Outlook Mail Messages and a filter string such as "[Subject]='Invoice' AND [ReceivedTime] > '01/01/2024'". IMAP/SMTP activities need host, port and SSL settings and are the choice for servers without Outlook. Integration Service connectors (Office 365, Gmail) are the cloud-friendly path.
Traps
- Double quotes or
=alone inside Outlook filter strings; the syntax requires single quotes andeq/=carefully. - Read Range with AddHeaders misconfigured, shifting every column.
- Saving attachments to the same filename in a loop, overwriting earlier files.
- Storing SMTP passwords in the workflow instead of an Orchestrator credential asset.
Rule of thumb
Read once into a DataTable and process in memory; never loop cell-by-cell with Read Cell unless the sheet is tiny.