Utilizing XPath in Workflow - Tutorial & Tips

Learn about Using XPath in your flow

Understanding how XPath functions in a workflow can significantly enhance your effectiveness in manipulating XML or JSON content. XPath, a query language for selecting nodes from an XML document, can be used intricately with Flow to query XML text, as Flow enables conversion of JSON content into XML format. This enriched knowledge is invaluable in complex data extraction situations, among others, in a JSON/XML message, that otherwise cannot be executed on Flow without employing an “Apply to each” loop.

It's also worth noting that XPath could be instrumental in augmenting Flow's performance. For instance, an operation that may require a loop in traditional Flow setup can be achieved using XPath without the loop. This results in exceptional performance enhancement, especially when handling large amounts of data. XPath's proficiency and performance, even though making it a rather complex tool, earn it an indelible place in this field.

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• Understand XPath and its functionality
• Analyze how XPath interacts with Flow
• Determine how to employ XPath in the extraction of information
• Explore how XPath can be used to boost the performance of Flow

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The application of XPath is demonstrated in the flowing blog post using a practical problem scenario where the team hierarchy of an organization is retrieved. The hierarchy, formatted differently with the pair of team member and team leader, poses a problem that can be solved using different methods of Flow, one of which involves XPath.

Another notable aspect of this demonstration is the clear improvement in performance, noticeably in the comparison between the traditional solution and the XPath based method. This example proves that leveraging XPath can save time and make your workflow efficient.

To further comprehend XPath and its broad perspective of applications, refer to other published articles such as XPath to the rescue in a Power Automate integration authored by my colleague, Antti Pajunen. Furthermore, subscribe to our monthly email newsletter, Forward Forever News, for more insights and articles about Power Apps, Power Automate, and Power BI.

More links on about Using XPath in your flow

Using XPath in your flow

Jan 23, 2023 — XPath is an excellent tool in certain situations. It's performant, but in return you usually get a somewhat unreadable implementation. It always ...

How to Parse XML in Power Automate using XPath

Sep 9, 2020 — To use XPath in a Flow we create a new Compose action. Click on the inputs field and select expression. ... If you want to see the result of your ...

XPath to the rescue in a Power Automate integration

Feb 11, 2022 — The solution. Before we dissect our flow, let's open up what XPath means. In short, XPath is used for selecting nodes from an XML document.

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