Power Virtual Agents capabilities and features are now part of Microsoft Copilot Studio following significant investments in generative AI and enhanced integrations across Microsoft Copilot.
Some articles and screenshots may refer to Power Virtual Agents while we update documentation and training content.
As you design your bot in Microsoft Copilot Studio, you can use the Test bot pane to see how the bot leads a customer through the bot conversation.
To help you find and fix unexpected behavior, you can enable tracking between topics to take you through the bot conversation step-by-step, and go to the corresponding node in the authoring canvas.
Use the Test bot pane to walk through your bot conversations as the user. It's a good way to make sure your topics are working and that conversations flow as you expect.
Follow a conversation through a topic
If the Test bot pane is hidden, open it by selecting Test your bot.
In the Type your message field, enter some text. If the text is similar to a trigger phrase for a topic, that topic will begin.
Select the bot response in the Test bot pane. This takes you to the topic and the node that sent the response. Nodes that have fired display a colored checkmark and a colored bottom border.
Note
As you continue the conversation with the test bot in the same topic, each node that fires is marked with the checkbox and bottom border and centered in the canvas.
Continue the conversation, testing that the bot flows as intended in the topic.
You can update a topic at any time while interacting with the test bot. Simply save your topic to apply changes and continue the conversation with your bot.
Your conversation is not automatically cleared when you save a topic. If at any point you want to clear the conversation from your test bot and start over, select the Reset button.
Track topic-to-topic
You can automatically navigate across topics to each node that fires, by using the Track topic-to-topic setting.
At the top of the Test bot pane, set Track topic-to-topic to On.
Continue interacting with your bot. As you navigate to each node that fires, you can switch topics along with the conversation.
Test variable values
You can observe the values of your variables as you test your bot.
Open the test bot.
Open the Variables pane and select the Test tab. If a variable has values, it appears here. Any empty variables appear as undefined.
To inspect variable properties, select the link in the value to display variable details.
While you're testing your bot, you can capture the content of and diagnostics data about the conversation, and save it as a file. You can then analyze the data to troubleshoot issues, such as the bot not responding in the way you expect.
Warning
The snapshot file contains all your bot content, which may include sensitive information.
At the top of the Test bot pane, select the menu icon (⋮), then select Save snapshot.
Select Save to save the bot content and conversational diagnostics in a .zip archive file named botContent.zip.
The botContent.zip file contains two files:
dialog.json contains conversational diagnostics, including detailed descriptions of errors.
botContent.yml contains the bot's topics and other content, including entities and variables used.
Test a topic in the Test bot pane
Use the Test bot pane to walk through your bot conversations as the user. It's a good way to make sure your topics are working and that conversations flow as you expect.
If the Test bot pane is hidden, select Test your bot at the bottom of the left side panel to open it.
Select Reset at the top of the Test bot pane to clear previous conversations.
Resetting makes it easier to follow the flow of the current topic without getting confused by previous conversations.
At the Type your message prompt, enter one of the topic's trigger phrases.
Track through the topic's conversation path
The trigger phrase starts the conversation. The Test bot pane displays the bot's response and the user response choices you specified.
Continue the conversation, testing that it flows as intended when you designed in the topic.
You can return to a topic's authoring canvas at any time to revise the conversation path. The Test bot pane automatically refreshes when you save changes to a topic.
Save conversation snapshots
While you're testing your bot in the Test bot pane, you can capture the content of, and diagnostics data about, the conversation and save it in a file. You can analyze the data to troubleshoot issues, such as the bot not responding in the way you expect.
Warning
The snapshot file contains all your bot content, which may include sensitive information.
At the top of the Test bot pane, select the More icon (⋮), and then select Save snapshot.
Save conversation snapshots
Select Save.
The bot's content and conversational diagnostics are saved in a .zip archive file called DSAT.zip. The DSAT.zip file contains two files, botContent.json and dialog.json:
dialog.json contains conversational diagnostics, including detailed descriptions of errors.
botContent.json contains the bot's topics and other content, including entities and variables used in the bot.
Report issues with your bot conversations
Help us improve Microsoft Copilot Studio by using the Flag an issue command in the Test bot pane to tell us about issues with your conversations.
At the top of the Test bot pane, select the flag icon (Flag an issue)
Select Flag issue.
The Flag an issue command sends the conversation ID to Microsoft. The conversation ID is a unique identifier that Microsoft uses to troubleshoot an issue with the conversation. Other information, such as the contents of the DSAT.zip file, isn't sent when you flag an issue.
All information collected is anonymous and will be used to help improve bot quality.
Test a topic in the Test bot pane
If the Test bot pane is hidden, open it by selecting Test your bot in the navigation menu.
It's a good idea to select Reset at the top of the Test bot pane to clear previous conversations. Clearing previous conversations makes it easier to see the flow of the topic you want to see without getting confused by previous conversations.
At the Type your message prompt at the bottom of the Test bot pane, enter a trigger phrase for the topic.
The trigger phrase starts the topic's conversation, and the Test bot pane displays the bot responses and user response choices you specified.
Continue the conversation, testing that it flows in the intended as designed in the topic.
Select a response in the Test bot pane, which will take you to the response in the conversation editor for that topic. The authoring canvas displays highlighted nodes in green.
You can return to the authoring canvas for the topic at any time to revise it's conversation path. The Test chat pane will automatically refresh itself when you save changes to a topic.
Track through the topic's conversation path
As you fine-tune your bot, it can be useful to enable tracking between topics so you can follow through the conversation path step by step.
If the Test bot pane is hidden, open it by selecting Test your bot in the navigation menu.
At the top of the Test bot pane, set Track between topics to On.
Enter a trigger phrase for the topic you want to check, and then continue testing the conversation.
As you move through the conversation in the Test bot pane, the authoring canvas highlights the current place in the conversation path. The authoring canvas displays highlighted nodes in green.
To navigate to an earlier place in the conversation path in the authoring canvas, select it in the Test bot pane.
If the conversation path in the Test your bot pane moves from one topic to another topic, the authoring canvas refreshes and moves between topics to the appropriate highlighted nodes.
Note
Help us improve Microsoft Copilot Studio by flagging issues with the Flag an issue command on the Test bot pane. This submits your conversation ID to Microsoft; the ID is a unique identifier that Microsoft uses to troubleshoot the issue of the conversation. Other information, such as is stored in the DSAT.zip file, is not sent when you flag an issue. All information collected remains anonymous and will be used to help improve bot quality.