Project settings

Project settings set default values for all of a project’s UI activities (desktop, browser and SAP), instead of setting them activity by activity, and holds the project data: name, version, platform and maximum run duration.

For example: if the application you automate is slow and every click needs to wait up to 60 seconds for its button to appear, you set it once in the project and every activity inherits it.

Project platform

When you create the project you choose where it runs, and it can’t be changed later (Project properties shows it with a lock):

• Windows: Windows robots, with a desktop. Every activity is available: desktop, SAP, browser, Office…
• Headless: Zoan Cloud’s display-less robots. There’s no desktop, SAP GUI or COM, so the Designer hides Windows-only activities (desktop, SAP, UI, OCR, Outlook): they don’t show in the palette, Recent, Favorites or search (Ctrl+K). A line in the palette says how many are hidden.
  • If a playbook already has one of those activities (pasted from another project, for example), it’s marked as a “Windows-only activity” error and can’t be run or published.
  • The recorder only records browser actions.

Where to configure it

In the Designer: ☰ → File → Project properties…. It also opens with a double click (or Enter) on the root of the Project panel, or from the project name menu in the top bar. It has three tabs:

• General: project ID (read-only), name, description, version, author, tags and platform.
• UI automation: the values in the table below.
• Package: minimum engine version, maximum run duration and a manifest preview.

Click Save to apply the changes.

UI automation

Setting	What it does	If left empty
Timeout to find an element (seconds)	How long each activity waits for the element it acts on (a button, a field, a cell) to appear before failing.	Each activity uses its own (usually 30 s).
Delay before each action (ms)	Pause before each UI activity.	No pause.
Delay after each action (ms)	Pause after each UI activity. Useful for applications that need a moment to react after a click.	No pause.
Default browser	Browser Open Browser opens when the activity doesn’t pick one: Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Chromium.	Chrome.
Browser window	Whether Open Browser opens the browser with a window or hidden (headless).	Visible; hidden on machines without a display (see below).

Which value wins

1. A value set on the activity itself always wins.
2. If the activity doesn’t have one, the project value is used.
3. If the project doesn’t define it either, the activity’s usual default.

A project without these settings uses each activity’s own values.

In the properties panel, under the timeout field of an activity where you left it empty, the Designer reminds you which value it will use: “Empty: 60 s (project setting)”.

Which activities it applies to

• Timeout: desktop activities that look for an element (Win Click, Win Type, Win Get Text, Win Attach, Win Wait For…), browser page activities (Page Click, Page Fill, Page Get Text, Page Wait For, Page Navigate…) and SAP activities through the elementTimeout of SAP — Attach and SAP — Log on.
  • It doesn’t apply to times that aren’t about finding an element: starting the browser (Open Browser), waiting for a download, opening an application (Open App) or waiting for an SAP session to appear.
  • Nor to checks that are instant by design (desktop and browser Element Exists).
• Delays: every desktop, browser and SAP activity that acts on an element. Scopes (Win Attach, Open Browser, SAP — Attach with their body) don’t wait: the steps inside them do.
• Browser and window: the Open Browser activity.

Maximum run duration

In the Package tab, Maximum duration of a run (minutes) is optional. If a run takes longer, it is ended with a clear error and the machine is free for what comes next. Empty means no limit. It accepts 1 to 10080 minutes (7 days).

• Zoan Cloud can set another limit per process, per trigger or per run.
• It doesn’t apply while debugging in the Designer: you can stay at a breakpoint as long as you need.

Where it’s stored

In the project file, project.zoanproj, under settings:

"settings": {
  "ui":        { "timeoutMs": 60000, "delayBeforeMs": 0, "delayAfterMs": 300 },
  "browser":   { "name": "edge", "headless": true },
  "execution": { "maxDurationMinutes": 120 }
}

Because it travels inside the published package, the same settings apply in the Designer, on Windows robots and on Zoan Cloud’s display-less robots.

Robots without a display

Zoan Cloud’s display-less robots (the ones running headless-platform processes) have nowhere to open a window. If neither the activity nor the project says otherwise, Open Browser opens the browser hidden automatically. Desktop and SAP activities can’t be used on those robots: they need Windows.

Next steps

• Debugging: test the playbook with these timeouts before publishing it.
• Selectors: make every activity find its element the first time.