Accessing the IBM RPA UI within the Platform UI

The Robotic Process Automation user interface is accessible through either the IBM Automation Platform UI or the IBM RPA UI route.

Accessing the Platform UI

In the OpenShift console, go to the Networking > Routes section in the namespace you created the IBM RPA instance in. You can find a route that is named cpd. The location of this Route is the URL that points to the Platform UI page.

Alternatively, you can use the command line to obtain the URL for the Platform UI:

oc get routes -n <NAMESPACE> | grep cpd
cpd                           cpd-<NAMESPACE>.<CLUSTER_HOST_NAME>                                  ibm-nginx-svc              ibm-nginx-https-port   passthrough/Redirect   None

The administrator needs to set up users and their permissions before they can sign in. For the first time access, the administrator can log in by using their Red Hat® OpenShift® Container Platform credentials or with the default admin user. For more information on how to retrieve the default admin credentials and changing the password, see the Accessing your cluster by using the console documentation.

Note:For first time access, ROKS or ROSA users need to login using the default admin user.

Configure the Platform UI roles and permissions for IBM RPA

Only authorized users can see the IBM RPA capabilities in the navigation menu.

During the user creation, you can assign the following IBM RPA roles:

Role Default permissions Service contributing permissions Service creating the role
Automation Administrator No default permissions defined IBM Cloud Paks for Automation Automation foundation
Automation Analyst No default permissions defined IBM Cloud Paks for Automation Automation foundation
Automation Developer No default permissions defined IBM Cloud Paks for Automation Automation foundation
Automation Operator No default permissions defined IBM Cloud Paks for Automation Automation foundation

When you install IBM Robotic Process Automation, the following permissions are added to these roles:

Role Permissions
Automation Administrator rpa-manage and rpa-create
Automation Developer rpa-manage
Automation Analyst rpa-manage

An IBM RPA Control Center option in the Platform UI navigation menu is also created. This option is available for users that have at least one of the following permissions:

  • rpa-manage
  • rpa-create
  • rpa-view

To learn more, see Managing users.

Accessing the IBM RPA UI within the Platform UI

You can find the link to access the IBM RPA application in the Run / Robotic Process Automation section in the navigation window.

Zen-navbar

Configuring single sign-on

To configure single sign-on for Robotic Process Automation, see Getting Started with IBM Cloud Paks.

Accessing the IBM RPA UI

You can obtain the URLs for the IBM RPA endpoints from the routes in your namespace.

This is only useful if you set createRoutes to true in your Custom Resource. See more at Configuring custom resources.

Viewing the IBM RPA routes on OpenShift

To view the routes in your namespace, go to the Networking > Routes page in the OpenShift console as shown:

View routes in namespace on OpenShift console

Endpoint URLs

For each route, the Location column contains the URL you need:

  • API server endpoint
    The endpoint of the IBM RPA's REST API. The route is named <instance-name>-apiserver.
  • UI endpoint
    The URL of the IBM RPA Control Center UI application. The route is named <instance-name>-ui.

For both endpoints, replace <instance-name> with the name of your IBM RPA custom resource.

Note:If you use the self-signed certificates that are generated by the operator, you must accept the API server certificate before you access the IBM RPA UI for the first time. To accept the certificate, access the following URL in your browser: /v1.0/en/configuration.
The is the external API server endpoint URL from the route. After you accept the self-signed certificate, you can proceed to the UI endpoint. Each IBM RPA instance that you create has unique certificates.

Alternatively, you can provide your own trusted CA certificate. For more information, see TLS certificates.

The API and UI endpoints are not exposed by OpenShift routes and can only be accessed via the Platform UI. To access the Endpoint URLs, use the following commands:

Accessing the UI endpoint:

oc get configmap -n <NAMESPACE> <RPA-INSTANCE-NAME>-zen-rpa-routes -o "jsonpath={ .data.UI }"

Accessing the API endpoint:

oc get configmap -n <NAMESPACE> <RPA-INSTANCE-NAME>-zen-rpa-routes -o "jsonpath={ .data.API }"