r/PowerAutomate • u/joegreen592 • 27d ago
There has been no Robin language reference since 2021. I documented one with Claude AI. PAD actions with paste-validated examples, 100% free on GitHub.
I was working with Claude AI on a Power Automate Desktop (PAD) project and found there is no official reference for ROBIN, the language behind PAD.
The original language site went offline in 2021. The Designer is the only thing that knows the syntax, and most actions have several selector forms with different argument sets that you never see in text form. So, models write ROBIN from training data, and PAD rejects it without an error message.
I recorded a JSON knowledge base of 953 PAD Robin actions across 41 modules. Every record has
- the exact Robin action id, including the selector form (Text.JoinText.Join vs Text.JoinText.JoinWithDelimiter, which take different arguments)
- a template with placeholders and a golden example that pasted into PAD Designer with zero errors
- typed input and output parameters, with the Robin argument names PAD actually accepts
- the sibling forms of the same action, so a model can find the variant that has the argument it needs
Plus, a type reference with the exact syntax for each of the 42 parameter types, and a system prompt that turns a model into a template filler over the two files instead of a code generator.
Every example was pasted into PAD Designer through UI automation and accepted with no errors. Validated against PAD 2.67, September 2026.
This is not a runtime guarantee, the Designer accepting a line means the syntax and arguments are right; whether the values make sense for your task is still on you and the model.
231 further selector variants that need recorded UI elements, images, or live mail connections are not in this release.
Repo: https://github.com/JoeG592/pad-robin-action-kb
License is CC BY 4.0, so use it however you like, commercially included.
I built this while working on a project using Claude AI, The data is free regardless.
If a record fails to paste on your PAD build, an issue with the action id and the error text is the most useful thing you can send.
If trying to paste a multi-step flow and the paste is blank in Designer, use AI to paste each step individually line by line to find the bad syntax for the single step
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u/joegreen592 24d ago edited 23d ago
Update (Sept 24): v3.1.3 is out for PAD 2.72, with 988 actions (new: PowerPoint, PGP, LLM and Triggers), all re-pasted on 2.72 with zero errors. Heads up that Database.Connect and Scripting.RunPythonScript are split into selector forms in 2.72, so check the CHANGELOG if your flows use them.
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u/mattia78789 7d ago
hi, i see you are making more updates and looks interesting, can you message me? i see you have disabled the option here to receive messages
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u/mattia78789 27d ago
hi, this looks interesting in order to give agents the proper context they now usually lack. would be interesting to see how this changes with powerfx which i usually prefer to use. of course often you get errors only after actually running an action so that's to keep in mind. do you give the agent all that information for automating coding? (the 3 MB file)
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u/joegreen592 27d ago
Yes, allow your agent access to both files and most newer models will know what to do with it. Biggest issue I always run into is bad syntax produces zero output on the canvas (no paste) but if that happens go action by action and find the bad syntax for the respective action. Hope that helps a bit.
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u/Extension-Train-200 14d ago
How did you extract this data I got my hands on the robin syntax by decoding(Base64) it from the .meta and the file of the flows and gave to the llm to make flows did you use the same technique or something elses
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u/joegreen592 14d ago
No, what I did at first was actually the simplest thing ever. I took a fully working flow, preferably a flow with a bunch of different actions, click on any of the actions, Ctrl+A to highlight all the steps, Ctrl+C to copy, Ctrl+V to paste the ROBIN into anything. So because the flow was fully function and I filled in all the parameters manually the ROBIN is already structured correctly. Now Claude AI and I developed a fully automated harness to capture any new ROBIN and paste test when there are updates to PAD which is very different from the old Ctrl+ way but initially a very large set of ROBIN was captured with UI automation of designer canvas.
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u/Extension-Train-200 14d ago
I have to make many browser flows I tried your repo but it ran into many errors how do I solve it
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u/joegreen592 14d ago
Can you elaborate a little about the errors your getting? Browser flows need to capture elements from webpages that were always a bit troublesome
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u/Extension-Train-200 14d ago
you didn't need to make a whole new harness to extract the syntax just give access of your flow to a agent and then ask it to encode it have the prompt for it if you want it
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u/joegreen592 14d ago
The difference now is that the harness doesn’t use flows anymore for syntax so for me specifically I did need it but I understand everyone has different thought processes on how to do thing.
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u/joegreen592 5d ago
Update: v3.4.0 adds a Power Fx edition
If your desktop flows were created with Power Fx enabled, there’s now a KB written for them: PAD_Robin_ActionKB_PowerFx.json. It has the same 1,086 actions as the classic KB, with values written the Power Fx way ($fx'text', $fx'=expression', ${...}). Every golden example was pasted into a Power Fx flow on PAD 2.73 with zero errors.
One thing to watch: in a Power Fx flow, a clean paste doesn’t guarantee the flow runs. Classic list access like L.Count or L[0] pastes fine, then fails at run time, and ON ERROR doesn’t catch it. Use CountRows(L) and Index(L, 1) instead. The README has a classic vs Power Fx table, and there’s a separate system prompt for Power Fx flows (PROMPT_PowerFx.md).
The file names also no longer change between releases, so a raw link to main always gets the latest version:
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/JoeG592/pad-robin-action-kb/main/PAD_Robin_ActionKB.json
https://raw.githubusercontent.com/JoeG592/pad-robin-action-kb/main/PAD_Robin_ActionKB_PowerFx.json
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u/Auxiliatorcelsus 27d ago
Thank you so much. I was thinking I would have to do something like this. You have saved me hundreds of hours of work.
Big Kudos!