Cloud and local projects-Robotic Process Automation(RPA)-阿里云帮助中心

Learn about cloud and local projects.

Project types

A project is a collection of files for one or more workflows, including project files, workflow files, and component dependencies. The platform supports two storage options: local and cloud. It also supports two development modes: code-based and visual.

This document focuses on the storage options for projects:

Local project: Project files are stored on your local disk and are not uploaded to the server. You can only view and edit these projects in your local editor.
Cloud project: Project files are stored on the server. Member accounts with the required permissions can edit the project after logging in to the editor.

Cloud projects

You can perform the following operations on cloud projects:

Operation	Location	Description
Create a cloud project	Editor	For detailed steps, see Create a new project.
Open and edit a cloud project	Editor	By default, only a cloud project's administrator can open and edit it in the editor. To allow multiple users to edit the cloud project, the project administrator must add them as developers in Console - Cloud Projects.
Save a cloud project	Editor	By default, the editor automatically saves your changes to the server every 15 minutes during visual or code-based development. You can disable autosave or change the interval in the editor's Preferences. Cloud projects do not support version control. Only one version of the project is saved.
Copy a cloud project	Editor	You can create a copy of a cloud project. The new copy can be saved as either a cloud project or a local project.
Delete a cloud project	Console	The administrator of the cloud project or a super administrator must perform this operation in Console - Cloud Projects.
Manage developers for a cloud project	Console	The administrator of the cloud project or a super administrator must perform this operation in Console - Cloud Projects. You can add multiple developers to a cloud project. Added developers can open, edit, and save the cloud project in the editor. Avoid having multiple users edit the same cloud project simultaneously from different editors, as this can cause changes to be overwritten.
Transfer ownership of a cloud project	Console	The administrator of the cloud project or a super administrator must perform this operation in Console - Cloud Projects. A cloud project can have only one administrator.

Local projects

You can perform the following operations on local projects:

Operation	Location	Description
Create a local project	Editor	For detailed steps, see Create a new project. A local project is saved to the local disk on the computer where the editor runs.
Open and edit a local project	Editor	To edit a local project, open its folder from your local disk.
Save a local project	Editor	By default, the editor automatically saves your changes to the local disk every 15 minutes during visual or code-based development. You can disable autosave or change the interval in the editor's Preferences.
Copy a local project	Editor	You can create a copy of a local project. The new copy can be saved as either a cloud project or a local project.
Delete a local project	--	The editor does not support deleting files from your local disk. You must delete the project files manually through your operating system.

Local and cloud project conversion

You can use the "Copy as" feature in the editor to convert between local and cloud projects, as shown in the following figure:

Version control for projects

Cloud projects provide basic cloud storage and access for your project files, but they do not currently support version control. Only one version of the project is saved.
You can use external version control tools to manage local projects and store them in your own code repository.
- Install a client for a version control tool, such as Git or SVN, on the computer running the editor.
- Add the local project folder to your code repository and regularly commit changes to a remote code repository.