Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
Iβd love to say I have that software like Cher Iβm Clueless that plans my outfits...but letβs be honest, every conference T-shirt goes with jeans! #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I automate a bunch of things for my entrepreneur/side projects. If its a task that takes me longer than 5 minutes and I have to do it every week, I try to automate it. It tends to be the things I think are important to do, but I just don't have the bandwidth to do. #DevDiscuss
Lol this #DevDiscuss topic on personal automation is perfect for this: my first big automation win was a Ruby script that automated converting files for my new site. Ruby is great for it and easy to use!
Got a post on it - https://t.co/EutAfZNEW9https://t.co/jNuysnap0K
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I mention this anecdote a lot, but Iβve automated logging, formatting, and tallying of every expenditure from my chase account into a budget sheet.
It has made me way worse about financial mindfulness...
#DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
When I built out my desktop this year I decided to use @chocolateynuget as much as I could. It's still not perfect but better than manually downloading and running installers. One of the many things I miss on windows that Linux seems to get right. #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I haven't used Ruby for scripting yet, but I have to say Python is incredible for this as well. I have seen some seriously handy Python scripts for a bunch of the mundane tasks we have to do at work. #DevDiscuss
My biggest win to date of personal automation has been https://t.co/3ocRT8fU6u which I made 5 years ago so I wouldnt have to constantly remind my husband to do things. It has worked wonders for our marriage π #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
There are so many facets to personal automation it's hard to pick one in particular.
Automating podcast downloading, tagging, sorting, moving to the MP3 player, and purging old episodes? π
Mail-merge our Christmas letter & email it out? π
Generate invoices? π
#DevDiscuss
@ThePracticalDev I also have an 800 line powershell profile I've built up over the last 6 years at work that I need to tidy up and throw on github so I can use it elsewhere. #DevDiscuss
Yeah, I went to Ruby first myself just for it's developer-friendly syntax and some past exposure. But from what (little) I know, Python is likely better for data-related tasks especially. #DevDiscuss
Ok, real answer. Iβm actually a bit skittish about what I even use automation for. Automating bills is great until there is an issue and you didnβt notice things didnβt get paid. #DevDiscuss
A lot of #AWS Lambda honestly. Serverless is perfect for these types of things because I can plug them in CRON expressions and be done with it. (assuming there is APIs I can use for the task) #DevDiscuss
I use automation for everything I can... Small scripts is what I'm known for π that's why I love Python & Go so much. Beautiful languages for automation. #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
Python has been incredibly helpful when working in an #AWS environment as well because it tends to be preloaded everywhere, so I can just transfer the script, install dependencies, and go. #DevDiscuss
Another good tool for simple automation: @IFTTT. It's simpler and connects lots of different services, and it also can connect to web hooks too. Right now I use it mostly for "If I do X, send a tweet about it." #DevDiscuss
I like making use of tools that are already available. Like this one that helps me out of commands that I mis-typed (not for those who aren't fond of a curseword) https://t.co/lyyCmjNY43#DevDiscuss
All my bills are auto payment, it makes life so much easier. I actually automate a lot of my personal finance so that money goes where I want it to go and I never have to think about it. #DevDiscuss
I'd add "and if it's easy to skip a step or do a step wrong, it's all the more important to automate it." Most of my scripts are there to prevent me from missing something obvious π
#DevDiscuss
Though Iβll admit the days I feel like dressing up or have somewhere to go after work I get sooo many comments (or used to in previous roles) #DevDiscuss
#DevDiscuss#win when I was starting in tech I used basic scripts to automate daily tasks like copying files, scraping data to generate reports and etc. Simple for me to make but brought great value to the users who weren't technical
I've been gradually building some personal automation around my banking and money management.
Basically stitching together banking services I use so I have some central control over things with less overhead. It's a long term project and has been fun.
#DevDiscuss
This book is the most scamy title you will ever see, but it actually has a ton of automation tips and tricks when it comes your personal finances. #DevDiscusshttps://t.co/gMJKliyHqw
See, I want to think about it? It helps me be more intentional about spending, even with a budget. But for constant bills like Netflix Iβm all over it! #DevDiscuss
I still don't have a *big win* on automation, but my next thing will be to play a little bit with this beautiful script @nnja made and customize it for my needs. #DevDiscuss
That's a good bonus criterion/ I tend to stick with "if its hard and I don't enjoy doing this every week", automate it. But you could certainly add, "there is a high likelihood ill screw this up manually". #DevDiscuss
Oh, just remembered. All of my lights at home are on timers, so when my alarm goes off my lights are already slowly coming up, and 30 minutes before bed (which is now) they start to dim. #DevDiscuss
Code formatting is something I used to put a lot of manual care into. Now I just let tools handle it for me.
If you haven't already, install Prettier in your code editor right now. You'll be more productive in focusing on what your code is doing over how it looks.
#DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I've tried some git automation before, but constantly messed it up... I don't know if it's the nature of Git or that I just wasn't good enough with writing Bash #DevDiscusshttps://t.co/vZvcFFuJPP
Automation is one of my favorite topics. On the personal side, my favorite is one that archives my Spotify Discover Weekly and release radar playlists got tired of them disappearing into the void! #DevDiscuss
Other times a sed or awk one-liner can make quick work automating a task that will only be performed once. But write that "automated" one-liner and discard vs. hand-edit hundreds of thousands of rows of data or eyeball finding some needle in a haystack? You bet.
#DevDiscuss
One of my favorite things about personal automation is I literally get to write something for no users besides myself. It can be very liberating and fun. No deadlines, no pressure to fix or paths I know I don't need to use much. Lots of hardcoding.
#DevDiscuss
For work, I'm all about @zapier . Literally built a business on their back at the start . Before I learned to code, it was a godsend. Still use it today- if I can do it on zapier, I'd rather not build it myself. #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
One hesitation I have with automation is automating tasks around sensitive info. Like if I wanted to regularly run a task related to finding bank statement info, I'd feel really scared putting it on a remote server like Heroku to run automatically. Advice on this? #DevDiscuss
I spent time today getting eslint to take care of my typescript. Now Iβm trying to figure out what works best for me as far as having eslint fix my code with a prettier plugin. #DevDiscuss
You have no idea how convenient having a dog is until you dont have one!!! I was in a non dog house last week and dropped food on the floor, I stared at it for 10 seconds before I realized, shit I actually have to pick that up #DevDiscuss
I like automation around tracking a lot. Automatically synced calendars, financial overview in one place, etc. Thats where I find value, but itβs rarely with things I built myself. Commercials products are easier because there is no maintenance. #DevDiscuss
For work, I'm all about @zapier . Literally built a business on their back at the start . Before I learned to code, it was a godsend. Still use it today- if I can do it on zapier, I'd rather not build it myself. #DevDiscuss
I built a service that would create a site for my podcast and keep it automatically updated.
It pulls in an RSS feed, stores episodes in a database, and runs a cron to check for new episodes.
I'm happy others are using it as well π
(shameless plug: @ironmicfm)
#DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I put some dotfiles on GitHub with my bash customizations (bash prompt, aliases, etc.) And my git aliases.
Learned my lesson after my computer crashed three times in three weeks and I had to Google how to do all that every time...
#DevDiscuss
I have a git repo where I keep a different branch for [work/server/personal] linux configurations, and a bootstrapping script to install a bunch of useful utilities. Makes setting up a new machine much easier #DevDiscusshttps://t.co/wyRS2FvLWo
On the topic of dev automation, all of my side projects are continously deployed so that I never have to think about it. Future topic: how continously deploying your own code can lead to unexpected results π #DevDiscuss
I put some dotfiles on GitHub with my bash customizations (bash prompt, aliases, etc.) And my git aliases.
Learned my lesson after my computer crashed three times in three weeks and I had to Google how to do all that every time...
#DevDiscuss
though to be fair, that's part of my personal automationβ¦it just happens to be IRL rather than online. Clean laundry gets hung on one side, next shirt to wear gets drawn from the other end. Even wear on clothes; negligible synaptic expenditure.
#DevDiscuss
I FINALLY did this yesterday! I destroyed and provisioned a new vagrant and realized I forgot to backup my bash file from the vagrant. Only going to make that mistake once #DevDiscuss
I FINALLY did this yesterday! I destroyed and provisioned a new vagrant and realized I forgot to backup my bash file from the vagrant. Only going to make that mistake once #DevDiscuss
Iβm not sure if this counts, but @stitchfix has automated teaching me how to dress like a civilian again. My stylistβs name is Jessica, and sheβs helped me adapt to the Annapolitan fare around here. π #DevDiscuss
By far my favorite automation feat is scraping anime photos and sending them to my email each morning. Simple, fun, and saves time for my nerd brain! #DevDiscuss
Here's one I got this morning :3
I think I've tried setting up stuff before though, but I stop it usually due to further automation tasks needing payment (if I set it up with a tool) or I'm not sure how to do it in code π #DevDiscuss
I used to have very little automation via aliases but then last year I broke my arm and had to type one handed. I now have a two letter alias for almost every git command in the book #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I automated a thing, sorta.... When someone puts a bug in Asana I have a receipt printer hooked to a Raspberry Pi that prints the bug out. My dream is to have one of those circular things with orders hanging off it like in a restaurant kitchen. #devdiscuss
Apparently with @IFTTT you can connect Alexa voice commands to automated tasks. But I'm scared of any automated tasks I (or someone else) may unintentionally trigger. #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
Did similarly (1st in Java, then Python) for scraping umpteen individual comics pages daily, downloading the comic images, then assembling them all into one local HTML file I could read offline without the horrid intrusions of advertisements, animations, upsell, etc.
#DevDiscuss
I haven't done too much personal automation, the only one that stood out to me was using @zapier to automate posting blog posts to my blog semi weekly, and updating an rss feed to use on https://t.co/qEO76W4DHn π
#devdiscuss
I automated a thing, sorta.... When someone puts a bug in Asana I have a receipt printer hooked to a Raspberry Pi that prints the bug out. My dream is to have one of those circular things with orders hanging off it like in a restaurant kitchen. #devdiscuss
Ah good use! Even better than mine since it's easier to get large updates while following comics. I still visit mine like once a month to check haha. #DevDiscuss
For most use cases around this, it will cost you $0. In my experience, these types of CRON workloads in #AWS Lambda cost you absolutely nothing because you tend to stay in the free tier. #DevDiscuss
I automated a thing, sorta.... When someone puts a bug in Asana I have a receipt printer hooked to a Raspberry Pi that prints the bug out. My dream is to have one of those circular things with orders hanging off it like in a restaurant kitchen. #devdiscuss
#DevDiscuss Vim has fame for being arcane, but my old editor (Sublime) was frustrating enough to use that I gave it a try. Some cool things Vim can do:
-change every instance of one word for another with single command
-record a set of actions to custom command to reuse
(pt.1)
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
Really cannot say enough good things about zapier. Been using them in my company for 6 years and currently have dozens of automations running. It's truly a lifesaver! #DevDiscuss
A weird automation idea I had...
There's a joke that every story is better if the 2nd line is "is then the murders began."
Idea: a twitter bot that finds newspaper headlines, adds that line, tweets the whole thing out, and I watch the fun unfold.
WHO IS WITH ME?! #DevDiscuss
One downside to automation is that automating certain tasks can cause you to forget how to actually do them. I have come across this a few times where I lose a snippet and it takes me a while to google how to do it again #DevDiscuss
Ah I do the same. My utility companies offer automatic payment of bill amounts. I also schedule my rent and student debt payments through the bank (glad my mom showed me how to do this!) #DevDiscusshttps://t.co/lI6YkegwGf
#DevDiscuss (pt.2)
-change entire phrase within () or {} or "" or <> etc. with one command
-change surrounding () or "" to {} or `` with one command
Well, there are many more examples, but common theme: lots of stuff with one command. Intuitive commands, too!
Our company does something similar, though I don't know the details. If the branch name has the ticket ID, the ticket shows a link to the branch and its status (in review, merged, etc) #DevDiscusshttps://t.co/vI3SSw9tMy
My best automation is having a script that runs from Google drive to delete anything that I deem marketing spam after 21 days. It all gets moved to a folder for me via a rule already and then I don't have to worry about emails taking up space. #devdiscuss
Oh I forgot we also link JIRA tickets to our Slack channel. So new engineering tickets we need to address are added and linked to in our channels #DevDiscuss
#DevDiscuss automation gone wrong: a coworker of mine had self-automated back-up of his master's project (this was in the days of CVS, but he wasn't using it). Two weeks before it was due his backup script blew the entire thing away and he had to recode it from scratch π
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
Some people don't like it,but I have @code set to save when I lose focus on a tab and I have format on save, so basically,I could write things poorly and then eslint/prettier kick in.Dirty secret...sometimes I format it poorly just to watch the magic that is prettier. #devdiscuss
#DevDiscuss (pt.3)
Intuitive:
-to (C)hange (S)urrounding "" to '' you type cs"'
-to (D)elete 3 (W)ords you type d3w
I won't lie, though: there IS some truth to the arcane-ness. It's still fairly intuitive when it becomes part of your workflow, but it takes time.
#DevDiscuss I wrote a script that lets me use my Trello board as a framework for artwork submissions that can be sent to all of the sites I normally post to. It's cut back on my "social media" time and helped organize my work habits overall!
I don't have a script, just a "Recovery" folder in a cloud drive that contains installers and config DBs for my essential programs, so all I have to do is click and wait while it does the work. The only thing I can't automatically install is IDE extensions. #DevDiscuss
My thought is it's a marketing email that I will for sure not care about in 3 months so it can just be deleted. I mainly only use them for promos anyway. #devdiscuss
One thing I really wish had more automation options was @NotionHQ. I use it to track and write so many things, and more automation options would be incredible. #DevDiscuss
#DevDiscuss (pt.4)
I also don't use Vim in command line, nor do I think that's the best way to use it. I use it inside VS Code, where my Cmd+/ comments a selection and Alt+Shift+down copies current line down. And where I have all my pretty syntax colors with no grief.
You never really know which automation tools will actually end in productivity compared with good old fashioned raw code, but this is a pretty neat idea:
https://t.co/04s9pTiVNt#DevDiscuss
I work with a system that uses a Windows desktop application with a unix server database. I've created numerous scripts to perform actions normally done in the Windows app that I can run within the database, saving me a huge amount of time troubleshooting DB issues. #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
I use @zapier and @IFTTT for some newsletter and social media automation. I'm running out of zaps though in the free tier π. I'm considering duplicating the same things using lambda functions on @Netlify. #DevDiscuss
Time for the #DevDiscuss Twitter chat
Tonight's topic is personal automation.
Let's get the conversation started:
- What kind of personal automation do make use of?
- Any stories of big automation wins, personal or otherwise?
- What about stories of automation gone wrong?
#DevDiscuss (pt.5)
If you want to try it out... hmm.... I don't think either Vim-tut or just installing the extension on VS code is the best... It can be a little hard to get started... maybe I should write something about it?
Going paid was worth it for me. Granted it was years ago, but being less restricted made me a little more creative in what I automated. At this point we're on their top tier plan and if I paid someone to do what zapier automated it would cost at least 10x as much. #DevDiscuss
In reply to
@venikunche, @zapier, @IFTTT, @Netlify
Kind of obvious for me: I recently wrote a post that's a high-level introduction to testing: different types, why they're important, and useful rules of thumb. I'm glad so many people have read and enjoyed it so far! #DevDiscusshttps://t.co/Sxs8mFMUYyhttps://t.co/K4SdKrlS6P
New blog post! I feel like so many posts gloss over the errors in favor of solutions. So I really leaned in. Hopefully it saves people a few hours of debugging! https://t.co/UqZEnAVctB#DevDiscuss
The Refined GitHub browser extension just passed 1000 commits and we also just finished the transition to TypeScript, thanks to @nickytonline and @bfred_it π https://t.co/APJxy0RSHB
