Task Builder General Options

Overview

Task Builder contains general options that enable control over a variety of interactive aspects. You can specify whether double-clicking an action/activity from the Actions panel adds it to the beginning or end of the task. Also, you can dictate what task appears the next time the Task Builder is open, whether it is a new task, all tasks from the previous session, or selected task from the previous session.

Task Builder General Options page can be accessed by navigating to File > Options > General. General options is a subset of Task Builder Options.

Related Topics

Parameters

The following table describes Task Builder's available General options:

Property Default Description
On startup, open New task Dictates the Task Builder startup behavior. This option is relevant only when the Task Builder is started manually from Windows Start menu or by the executable file using the Program Files directory (for example, C:\Program Files (x86)\Automate Desktop 2025\AMTB.exe). The previous task is never opened when Task Builder is started for a managed task through Task Administrator.
  • New task - A new task opens. Previously opened tasks are ignored.
  • Selected task from last session - Automatically re-opens the task that was last opened in the Task Builder. If multiple tasks are previously open, the active/selected task is the one that re-open.
  • All tasks from last session - Automatically re-opens all previously opened tasks.
When an action is selected Add step to end of task When double-clicking an action from the Actions panel, determines where that action is inserted in the Steps panel. The available options are:
  • Add step to end of task - The action is automatically inserted in the Steps as the last step.
  • Insert step at current selection - The action is automatically inserted in the Steps panel directly where the currently selected (highlighted) step is positioned. The current step and all others below it are moved a single step downward.
NOTE: In either case, a new step can be inserted at the desired position by dragging the action from the Actions panel onto the desired position in the Steps panel instead of double-clicking it.
Include error descriptions in Visual View  Only when different from default Controls when the Visual view (as opposed to AML view) in the Steps panel displays descriptive text about each step error handling along with descriptive text about the step itself. Every Automate Desktop step performs default error handling if the step fails. Select from the following:
  • Always - Always appends the error handling description to each step. This can cause extra, redundant text to be displayed in the Steps pane.
  • Only when different from default - Appends descriptive text about the step error handling only when an error handling option is set that is different from the default. This omits the error description in the majority of cases because the default error handling is sufficient for most steps (selected by default).
  • Never - Never appends the error handling description. The error handling can only be viewed by opening the properties dialog for the step.
Task Builder auto save options Disabled If selected, the Automatically save task(s) every 2 minutes option automatically saves tasks with an associated file every 2 minutes.
NOTE: After selecting or clearing this setting, Task Builder must be restarted before changes take effect.
Default task file location C:\Users\<user.name>\Documents\Automate Desktop 2025 Tasks By default, unmanaged tasks are saved to a location accessible by the user that initially installed the program. This location is different from the default managed task location and can vary depending on the operating system. To indicate the default location where an unmanaged task is saved, click the folder icon to browse available folders to select from or enter the full path to the folder in the text box.
NOTE: If specifying a network location as the default task location, it is critical to not use mapped drive letters. Always specify folders using UNC (Universal Naming Convention) paths. For example: X:\pathname\ should be \\servername\pathname\. This is because mapped drives are available only when a user logs in and this does not occur for LocalSystem services.