How to learn Desktop Automation?

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Stamimail
Posts: 1122
Joined: Sat Aug 31, 2013 9:05 pm

How to learn Desktop Automation?

Post by Stamimail »

What is the best way and best technology/tools to learn?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOGJxjohFyg
https://alternativeto.net/software/sikuli/

Are there jobs for that?
NotNull
Posts: 5238
Joined: Wed May 24, 2017 9:22 pm

Re: How to learn Desktop Automation?

Post by NotNull »

Depending on what you want to do, a macro recorder might also get the job done.
This will replay the actions you recorded before, but lacks evaluating conditions, like for example AutoHotKey can.

AutoHotKEy is a good candidate for automation. It has a somewhat relaxt syntax and can do about anything (*).
AutoIT is much more strict; more for real developers.
No experience with other tools.

Best way to learn:
Find something you want to automate, decide which tool would fit best and ... just start!
There is always a forum to help you out.
And even if it fails, you learned a lot for your next project.


(*)
Sidenote: after 5 days of usage, AHK seemed awesome. But after 5 weeks, that "relaxt" way of handling things started to work against me:
you're never sure if you had the right syntax, so you have to "try & error". Maybe things will get better in the sixth week :)

Most irritating till now: I couldn't get "function a" to work, until I read the help describing "function b": mutual exclusive with "function a". No mention of that in the help of function a ...
NotNull
Posts: 5238
Joined: Wed May 24, 2017 9:22 pm

Re: How to learn Desktop Automation?

Post by NotNull »

Just came across this:
Pulover's Macro Creator is a Free Automation Tool and Script Generator. It is based on AutoHotkey language and provides users with multiple automation functions, as well as a built-in recorder. Macros can be executed from the program itself or you can export them to AutoHotkey Script format or a standalone executable.
(No programming knowledge required)


Maybe that can help you to get started.
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