Automators: Recent Episodes
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Automation makes your life easier and everyone can do it. We tell you how. Hosted by David Sparks and Rosemary Orchard.
In this episode, Rosemary and David talk about what's happening with Alex Hay's apps for Shortcuts, and then dive into the world of plain HomeKit without extra services.
In this episode, Rosemary and David are joined by Sal Soghoian to talk about everything from launchers such as Alfred, to window management, and more voice control!
Rose and David share a collection of their favorite personal automations ranging from task and project management to home automation.
Timery developer Joe Hribar joins the Automators to talk about what's involved with adding automation tools to your App and some of Joe's favorite Automations.
David and Rosemary have been testing the latest Apple betas on all their devices, despite going off the grid things seem to be going well—and the latest beta has added more automation possibilities!
David and Rose review all the automation changes coming to the Apple platforms from the new software and tools announced at WWDC 2023.
Brett Terpstra joins David to explain some of his favorite automation tools and tricks.
Simon Støvring returns to talk about how much automation has changed and what his favourite new features are.
macOS Ventura has arrived! David and Rose break down all the new automating possibilities with the latest Mac operating system.
In this news, Rosemary and David look into non-continous automations and how breaking up a process can improve your automation abilities.
Rose and David are diving deep into the new iOS 16 Focus Modes. Do you think the Automators are just using a portion of the new Focus Mode features? Of course not! They are going straight into the deep end.
This week, David and Rosemary dive into David's new studio and plan out how to automate everything.
iOS 16 is nearly here, and there are a lot of automation updates to try out. In this episode, Rosemary and David walk you through them all.
From simple improvements to deep cross-linking and pages which update, there's a lot you can automate within your note-taking app of choice. In this episode, the automation gang take on Obsidian, and all of its plugins.
In this episode, Rose and David explain some of their favorite small automation tools and how they work.
Sal Soghoian takes David and Rosemary on an epic automation adventure. Starting with a look back at Automator on the Mac, and looking at the star Shortcuts developers now—before diving into Sal's latest project of custom voice control with OmniFocus and beyond.
Combinations! Lately, a lot of the best Mac automation tools have become conversant with each other. In this episode, Rose and David discuss the best ways to make automation apps work together.
In this episode, David and Rosemary are joined once more by Scotty Jackson. They take a look at home automation related to Focus Modes, and whether or not you can automate a podcast.
Hooray. It's a new WWDC and there are new Automation features! Rose and David are here to preview them all for you.
In this episode, Rosemary and David are joined by author, podcaster, and automator Dan Moren to talk about his automation experiences and solutions.
In this episode, Rosemary and David are joined by Daniel Jalkut, the man in the red sweater behind FastScripts, MarsEdit, and the Core Intuition podcast. Together they ponder the future of AppleScript, the restaurant at the end of the universe, and just how fast is a script?
In this episode of Automators, David and Rosemary look at their favourite automations, most wished for features, and how their automation has evolved in 100 episodes.
Hooray! It's Automation April and Federico Viticci and John Voorhees join the Automators to talk about it, along with some of their favorite automation.
Rose and David have several automation topics on the table in this episode including Shortcuts on the Mac, a Stream Deck check-in, and automating Obsidian. Also, they have thoughts on the new Mac Studio.
In this episode, David asks all the questions and we get into the nitty gritty details of how Rosemary's workflows and systems are being automated. From Hazel to Home Assistant, with a sprinkling of Airtable, there's variety and magic.
Mikah Sargent is using all the automations and joins this week to share some of his favorite Mac, iOS, and home workflows.
There's a new version of Keyboard Maestro with plenty of new automation tools. David and Rose have some great ideas of how to take advantage of the new features.
This week, Rosemary and David are joined by Jeff Richardson: lawyer by day, automator for life.
David's made a few changes and it's time for an Automator-style audit. In this episode Rose and David cover email, task management, calendars, desktop setups, web automation, and more.
David and Rosemary were joined by Dave Hamilton, the man with many automations - from nap time to making a window stay put, there's plenty of fun ideas to steal.
In this episode, David and Rosemary dive into Focus modes, how they use them, and of course, how they automate them - both setting, and automations when they trigger them.
Automating the Holidays has never been easier. Rose and David have a pile of holiday-related automations to make life easier and impress your friends and family.
In this episode, David and Rosemary are joined by Kelly Guimont and dive into getting started with automation, fun seasonal lighting, and the trouble with tribbles, er HomePod mini multiplication.
Ryan J.A. Murphy joins to share automation tips for Obsidian, augmented intelligence, and automated parenting.
Email automation is a thing, but email rules-based automation is another thing entirely.
Micro-Automations! It's those tiny little automations that can make your life easy. We've been building them and today we're sharing them.
In this episode, David and Rosemary cover the automation changes with iOS 15, and look at Shortcuts on the Mac. There's also an powerless automation conumdrum to solve!
iPad expert Chris Lawly joins in to talk about iPad-based automation and where a Mac fits in his workflow.
In this episode of Automators. David and Rosemary dive into Rosemary's updates to her home automation, smart locks, Home Assistant, and even a cute little robot mop...
Jason Snell joins the Automators to talk about his automation journey, some useful automations, and the promise of Shortcuts for Mac.
In this episode of Automators, Rosemary and David are joined by Zach, the creator of JellyCuts - a text IDE for Shortcuts.
Rose and David take on automating your calendar in several ways, including repeating events, templates, shortcuts, and calendar blocking apps. They also update the latest developments in automated time-tracking.
In this episode of Automators, Rosemary and David are joined by none other than Brett Terpstra, creator of Bunch, to talk about automation!
Hooray! Apple has made Shortcuts for the Mac. In this episode Rose and David dive deep on their initial impressions with the Mac version of Shortcuts and how well it plays with traditional Mac Automation.
David and Rosemary are joined by The Unicorn Sidekick, Kathy Campbell, to talk automation. From Lightroom and handling thousands of photos, to Shortcuts for launching music playback, there's plenty of automation to discover!
Rose and David dig in with ways they are using the Mac utility Alfred to automate using their Macs. This episode starts with the basics and then starts digging down.
In this episode, Rosemary and David chat to Jay Miller about how he automates, using Keyboard Maestro, Alfred, Bunch, and more.
Rose and David have gone all-in with Elgato's Stream Deck as an automation tool. In this episode, they go deep into all the tricks and workflows to turn your Stream Deck into an automation robot.
In this episode, David and Rosemary get Tim back on the show to talk about recent updates to Drafts and how he's using it to customize his workflow and how other people can take advantage of them too!
Rose and David explain many little automations that can improve your quality of life on your Mac.
In this episode, David and Rosemary tackle the sticky subject of automated capture. In places where no post-it has gone before, learn how they use Drafts, Obsidian, and task management and reference systems to handle their capture!
In this episode, David and Rosemary are joined by Matthew Cassinelli to talk about how his Shortcuts use has evolved with the changes to Shortcuts.
The Omni Group has released a remarkable automation platform for their apps, including OmniFocus. In this episode, automator Joe Buhlig joins to talk about his automation journey and working with the Omni Group's new platform.
Stephen Millard from Thought Asylum joins in to share his automation journey and his extraordinary ecosystem of plugins Drafts.
In this episode, David and Rosemary attempt to automate as much communication as possible, from email to messages and TextExpander to Shortcuts and Drafts, there's plenty of ways to get stuck in!
Automation wizard Adam Tow joins in this week to share the details of his new automation app, MFC Deck, and how Adam is automating his life.
The holidays are here so let's Automate! Rose and David cover 12 days of automation with cool ideas, tricks, and automation products to up your game this holiday season.
In this episode, David and Rosemary are joined by the magical Merlin Mann to talk about his automation journey and problems. From the Simpsons to Synology, and Shortcuts, there's plenty to hear about.
In this episode, David and Rosemary dive back into the wonderful world of home automation and look at Rosemary's new setup. From "You've Got Mail" to picking accessories, they go beyond the normal, and possibly the sane.
Alex Cox joins the Automators this week to talk home automation, Drafts, Shortcuts, and how to learn new automation.
In this episode, David and Rosemary look at the widgets in iOS 14 and how you can automate to make sure you have the data you need, under your thumb.
Changes are afoot in the cloud automation space. IFTTT now has a pro tier. Zapier continues to improve. There's a new player on our radar, Integromat. In this episode, Rose and David break down the current state of cloud automation.
In this episode, David and Rosemary dive into the iOS 14 update to Shortcuts and what it brings to all of us - as well as how they're using it.
TJ Luoma joins the Automators to talk about some of his favorite automations and all of the crazy things he is doing with his Stream Deck.
In this episode, David and Rosemary talk about how you can automate various aspects of meetings - from invitations to notes, and more!
Strap in gang! Rose and David are digging in this time on document automation. Whether you assemble your words with text, the Web, or Microsoft Word, we've got ideas and automations. Our hosts also tackle stacking shortcuts in iOS, email automation, and scripting OmniFocus.
In this episode, David and Rosemary are joined by Greg Pierce of Agile Tortoise to talk about Drafts and how they're using it and text-based automations to improve their lives with everything from dinner alerts to complex project templates.
In this episode, Dr. Drang returns to the show to talk about scripting - why it's beneficial, and above all, why everyone can do it!
Charty developer Rodrigo Araujo joins us to talk about using Charty with Shortcuts and share some of his favorite personal automations.
In this episode Ken Case, CEO of the Omni Group joins us to talk about adding automation in the form of Shortcuts and JavaScript scripting to the Omni Group apps, as well as his first, and favorite automations.
David and Rose celebrate episode 50 buy looking at the different flavors of automation and sharing some of their favorite automations for Shortcurts and Keyboard Maestro.
In this episode, David and Rosemary are joined by Scotty Jackson to talk about his Shortcuts based automations which cross into the web and beyond.
David and Rose tackle the best ways to automate your music. They also talk about automating calendars and email attachments.
In this episode, Rosemary and David dive into how they do a daily brief with Shortcuts on their devices.
Dark Noise Developer Charlie Chapman joins the Automators to talk about his automation story and how he implemented automation in his Dark Noise application.
In this week Rosemary and David dive headfirst into the feedback pile and look at Launchcuts as well as the new Pushcut automation server feature - and eye up some beta apps too!
Doug Adams from Doug's AppleScripts joins us to explain how he got started with AppleScripts, some of his favorites, and scripting areas of interest outside of AppleScript.
In this episode, David and Rosemary look at their automations surrounding capture and review. Between Shortcuts and web based automations, Drafts and URL schemes there's plenty you can automate.
Toolbox Pro developer (and documentary film editor) Alex Hay joins us to explain how he stumbled from scratching his own itch to making a powerful Siri Shortcuts utility app, Toolbox Pro.
In this episode, Rosemary and David tackle health tracking and how we can automate it to get all of the pluses with as few negatives as possible. From "smartifying" health devices, to building habits and accountability, it's all covered.
Tim Stringer from LearnOmniFocus.com joins the Automators to talk about his Mac, iOS, and web-based automation.
In this episode, David and Rosemary try all sorts of iBeacons and look at why, where, when, and how you use these little devices.
App developer Simon Leeb joins us to talk about his automation journey that turned into building an automation app, Pushcut. We also stray into the world of iBeacon and automation.
In this episide, David and Rosemary set their sights on Mac maintenance and how to automate it, from clearing your trash to managing duplicates and even handling those pesky .ics files, nothing is safe from their automation!
Sal Soghoian returns to the Automators to share his ingenious Mac control panel built with an iPad, a Luna display connector, and some clever automation. Sal also updates us on the Omni Javascript automation project.
In this episode David and Rosemary are joined by Don McAllister, founder of ScreenCastsOnline, to talk about the automations he has set up to make running a small business easier for everyone!
Roll up your sleeves Automators. This week Rose and David tackle regular expressions. What are they? How do you make them? Where do you use them? All those questions get answered in this episode. Regex isn't as daunting as it may first seem.
In this episode, Rosemary and David climb out of their suitcases armed with a variety of Shortcuts, Scriptable Scripts, Trello Boards, Reminders, TextExpander Snippets, Keyboard Maestro Macros and even a Drafts action group to automate and manage your packing lists.
Rose and David break down where Shortcuts is with respect to the 13.0 and 13.1 iOS updates. They also share some of their favorite new shortcuts with the new programming model. Also, David has a new Shortcuts Field Guide arriving next week.
In this episode, Rosemary and David get to talk to J.F. Brissette who really loves to automate. From automating Screenflow with Keyboard Maestro to using the Terminal as a launcher, as well as regular expressions and looking into combining Dropbox and Chronosync this episode will definitely teach you something - even if it's only about finding opportunities for automation!
Rose and David share some of their favorite recently created automations ranging from email, to meetings, to Rose's experiments on her new Mac mini.
In this episode David and Rose talk to Adam Tow, creator of MsgFiler, automator, and Shortcuts creator about a few of his amazing automations. From having photos taken on his DLSR automatically shared to him via iMessage to playing text adventure games with Shortcuts, there is plenty of automation fun to be had!
Rose and David take a closer look at Keyboard Maestro, the swiss army knife of automation for the Mac. Get $5 off David's new Keyboard Maestro Field Guide until the end of July with code "AUTOMATORSKM".
In this episode, Rose and David throw caution to the wind and install iOS & iPadOS betas on everything. There are crashes and updates, all in the name of finding out just how impressive the new Shortcuts really is.
Rose is now banned from scooters, and how get started with HomeKit - from building your system to real automations that actually make your life easier!
Happy WWDC week! David and Rose are on the ground at WWDC in San Jose to bring you up to speed on the new automation heading to iOS and iPadOS. They also recap WWDC, the Automator's meetup, and Rose describes how she lost a fight with a leaf.
Rose and David are getting serious about Airtable, the online-based database/spreadsheet/thingy. In this episode, they explain how Airtable works, how they're using it to Automate the Automators, and additional uses for Airtable.
In this episode Rosemary and David get Tim the Drafts Man to talk about how he uses Drafts, sharing actions, tips and tricks.
Text expansion is a simple sort of automation but also a powerful one. In this episode, Rose and David go deep on text automation, the tools they use, and some of their favorites ways to use text automation to get their work done faster.
In this episode of Automators Rosemary and David interview the mysterious internet legend Dr. Drang. As well as talking about Python, Perl, and AppleScript, they also dive into regular expressions, Shortcuts, Drafts, Keyboard Maestro, and how you can combine all of these in various different workflows!
Brett Terpstra, the mad scientist automator, joins to talk about how he got started in automation and share some great workflows for keyboard and trackpad automation, extending automation to your home, and more.
In this episode of Automators Rose and David dive into the recent and upcoming updates to Shortcuts. They nerd out on weather and notes, as well as their love for the dictionary updates!
Web programmer John Siracusa joins the Automators to share his thoughts on automation workflows, the best programming language for automation, and how automating your Mac desktop can become a road to madness.
This week David and Rose come to us live from PodCon with a very enthusiastic audience where they take the opportunity to dive into some of their travel automation setups. Once back in the studio they then go through some of the great feedback they've received recently.
Myke Hurley is relatively new to automation but found many ways to simplify his day via automation. In this episode, Myke share several simple to implement, yet crazy useful automations.
In this episode Rose and David dive into time tracking, including the why, the how, and then most importantly - how to automate it!
Rose and David tackle the challenge of journaling and how to use automation to make it easier.
In this episode David and Rose dive deep into the new version 3 of Launch Center Pro - with David Barnard from Contrast! They look at the history of the app, changes in version 3, and how it fits into their workflows today.
It's holiday time so what happens when you throw two automation nerds at things like holiday decorations, festive music, and ? Listen and find out.
Have you heard of the Shortcuts home screen fad? Where your home screen is just Shortcuts? David and Rose explore all of the possibilities, advantages, disadvantages and fun things you can do with Shortcuts on your home screen - and beyond.
This week David and Rose dive into the popular web automation service Zapier and explain how you can automate your systems via the web.
In this episode David and Rose get to talk to Simon Støvring, maker of Scriptable an app which allows you to control your iPhone with JavaScript. Simon shares some of the journey he experienced making the app, and what you can actually do with Scriptable.
Putting files in the right places is a pain in the neck. It's tedious and way too easy to make a mistake. Our intrepid automators are here to save the day on the Mac and iOS.
In this episode Rose and David dive into their very first feedback show. There's a quick look at what changed since the podcast started, a sneak peak of some of the upcoming episode topics, and much more including a brand new app - Scriptable, and automating timers!
iOS power user Matthew Cassinelli joins us to share some great iOS automation workflows.
In this episode of Automators David and Rose get nerdy with project templates. They start out with what a project template is and how it can help you, and go through using basic project templates all the way up to more complex options. While both of them are OmniFocus users, project templates can be used in any task management system - and is something that everyone can use.
Rose and David have been busy trying out the Siri Shortcuts beta. This episode looks closely at how Siri Shortcuts is better (and worse) than Workflow along with some hopes for where this is all heading.
In this episode we sat down with Sal Soghoian to learn how to use AppleScript to turn a Numbers table, column, or row, into a chart in Keynote. We also dove into the history of AppleScript, what parts of it mean, and how you can learn it too.
In this episode, our intrepid Automators dive into email and cover the best ways to get your Mac, iOS devices, and the web wrangling your email for you.
Starting with (complex) repeats, working all the way up to AppleScript - with examples. We take you through approximately 10 ways to automate calendar events!
Welcome to Automators! In this preview episode David Sparks and Rosemary Orchard tell you all about their new podcast, why they love automation, and that yes, you can automate things!