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Questions tagged [automation]

Automation is the process of having a computer do a repetitive task or a task that requires great precision or multiple steps, without requiring human intervention.

Automation is the process of having a computer do a repetitive task or a task that requires great precision or multiple steps, without requiring human intervention.

The term was originally used to refer to the operation of machinery without human supervision, frequently in manufacturing processes.

It is now used to refer to a variety of processes, including:

Examples of Stand-Alone Automation Tools

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How can I pass an argument to a PowerShell script?

There's a PowerShell script named itunesForward.ps1 that makes iTunes fast forward 30 seconds: $iTunes = New-Object -ComObject iTunes.Application if ($iTunes.playerstate -eq 1) { $iTunes.PlayerPosition = $iTunes.PlayerPosition + 30 } It is…
Boris Pavlović
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OS X Bash, 'watch' command

I'm looking for the best way to duplicate the Linux 'watch' command on Mac OS X. I'd like to run a command every few seconds to pattern match on the contents of an output file using 'tail' and 'sed'. What's my best option on a Mac, and can it be…
joseph.hainline
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Typing the Enter/Return key using Python and Selenium

I'm looking for a quick way to type the Enter or Return key in Selenium. Unfortunately, the form I'm trying to test (not my own code, so I can't modify) doesn't have a Submit button. When working with it manually, I just type Enter or Return. How…
croixhaug
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How can you automatically remove trailing whitespace in vim

I am getting 'trailing whitespace' errors trying to commit some files in git. I want to remove these trailing whitespace characters automatically right before I save python files. Can you configure vim to do this? If so, how?
Paul D. Eden
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NAnt or MSBuild, which one to choose and when?

I am aware there are other NAnt and MSBuild related questions on Stack Overflow, but I could not find a direct comparison between the two and so here is the question. When should one choose NAnt over MSBuild? Which one is better for what? Is NAnt…
Yordan Pavlov
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How to remove unused imports in Intellij IDEA on commit?

Is there a way to remove unused imports in Intellij IDEA on commit? It is not very optimal to do it manually, CTRL + ALT + O helps but it's still manual.
Leonid
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Casperjs/PhantomJs vs Selenium

We are using Selenium to automate our UI testing. Recently we have seen majority of our users using Chrome. So we wanted to know - pros and cons of using PhantomJS vs Selenium: Is there any real advantage in terms of performance, e.g. time taken to…
spirit3189
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R command for setting working directory to source file location in Rstudio

I am working out some tutorials in R. Each R code is contained in a specific folder. There are data files and other files in there. I want to open the .r file and source it such that I do not have to change the working directory in Rstudio as shown…
Stat-R
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WatiN or Selenium?

I'm going to start coding some automated tests of our presentation soon. It seems that everyone recommends WatiN and Selenium. Which do you prefer for automated testing of ASP.NET web forms? Which of these products work better for you? As a side…
DavGarcia
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Auto-reload browser when I save changes to html file, in Chrome?

I'm editing an HTML file in Vim and I want the browser to refresh whenever the file underneath changes. Is there a plugin for Google Chrome that will listen for changes to the file and auto refresh the page every time I save a change to the file? I…
Kevin Burke
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How do you automate Javascript minification for your Java web applications?

I'm interested in hearing how you prefer to automate Javascript minification for your Java web apps. Here are a few aspects I'm particularly interested in: How does it integrate? Is it part of your build tool, a servlet filter, a standalone program…
gustafc
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Have bash script answer interactive prompts

Is it possible to have a bash script automatically handle prompts that would normally be presented to the user with default actions? Currently I am using a bash script to call an in-house tool that will display prompts to the user (prompting for…
TJ L
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How to copy a file to a remote server in Python using SCP or SSH?

I have a text file on my local machine that is generated by a daily Python script run in cron. I would like to add a bit of code to have that file sent securely to my server over SSH.
Alok
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Matlab: Running an m-file from command-line

Suppose that; I have an m-file at location: C:\M1\M2\M3\mfile.m And exe file of the matlab is at this location: C:\E1\E2\E3\matlab.exe I want to run this m-file with Matlab, from command-line, for example inside a .bat file. How can I do this, is…
hkBattousai
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CRON job to run on the last day of the month

I need to create a CRON job that will run on the last day of every month. I will create it using cPanel. Any help is appreciated. Thanks
Utku Dalmaz
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