{"id":24989,"date":"2015-11-24T09:45:35","date_gmt":"2015-11-24T07:45:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/?p=24989"},"modified":"2015-11-24T09:45:35","modified_gmt":"2015-11-24T07:45:35","slug":"on-automation-of-work-relationship-and-everything-else","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2015\/11\/24\/on-automation-of-work-relationship-and-everything-else\/","title":{"rendered":"On automation of work, relationship, and everything else"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

OK, so this story is circulating the Russian-speaking web for a few days now. \u00a0Somebody got it translated to English and Business Insider<\/a> picked it up.<\/p>\n

After the guy left for a new job,\u00a0his former coworkers were looking through his work and discovered that the guy had automated all sorts of crazy things, including parts of his job, his relationships, and making coffee.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While it’s nice of them to link to the GitHub repository<\/a> with all the scripts, I hate to see how this is being over hyped.<\/p>\n

Firstly, the title itself – “A programmer wrote scripts to secretly automate a lot of his job \u2014 and email his wife and make a latte”. \u00a0There is nothing secret about this. \u00a0Mundane tasks are mundane tasks and we all hate doing them. \u00a0Programmers and sysadmins have the tools to automate those, so that’s what they do. \u00a0In fact, it’s quite a common practice.<\/p>\n

Secondly, the language of the article:<\/p>\n

After the guy left for a new job,\u00a0his former coworkers were looking through his work and discovered that the guy had automated all sorts of crazy things, including parts of his job, his relationships, and making coffee.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

How are scheduled messages “crazy things”? \u00a0I think these days you can even do that with mouse clicks in something as stupid as Microsoft Outlook. \u00a0And with all the APIs these days, it’s trivial to send SMS messages or make your own scheduled coffee.<\/p>\n

In regards to coffee in particular, The Linux Documentation Project<\/a> used to have The Coffee HOWTO for as long as I can remember (back in late 90’s at least). \u00a0It was updated in 2004 and is still available as Coffee Making <\/a>HOWTO.<\/p>\n

This article just once again highlights how far apart are business people and technical people in their understanding and use of technology. \u00a0In fact reminds me a story from one of my previous jobs when a release of a new major project on which the team worked for a few month was frowned upon, while the news of a replaced image slider on the website’s homepage got a standing ovation from the full room of staff… Sad, sad truth about the state of the world.<\/p>\n

And just so that I don’t leave it on that sad note, if you are not too technical and want to look at some of things which are trivial to do, have a look at IFTTT<\/a> website, which can help you connect your web services (social networks, emails, calendars, etc), smart devices (Android and iPhone gadgets, lights, etc), locations, and certain actions in just a few clicks. \u00a0And it’s all free too. \u00a0And if that’s not enough and you want to automate more, including some of your business stuff, have a look at Zapier<\/a>. \u00a0They are awesome too.<\/p>\n

Stop wasting time on silly things. \u00a0And maybe even learn to code…<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\n

OK, so this story is circulating the Russian-speaking web for a few days now. \u00a0Somebody got it translated to English and Business Insider picked it up. After the guy left for a new job,\u00a0his former coworkers were looking through his work and discovered that the guy had automated all sorts of crazy things, including parts … Continue reading On automation of work, relationship, and everything else<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"On automation of work, relationship, and everything else #WebWork #programming","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[1,18,62,1334],"tags":[17],"keyring_services":[],"class_list":["post-24989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","category-programming","category-technology","category-web-work","tag-work"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":18325,"url":"https:\/\/mamchenkov.net\/wordpress\/2013\/06\/07\/grunt-the-javascript-task-runner\/","url_meta":{"origin":24989,"position":0},"title":"GRUNT – The JavaScript Task Runner","author":"Leonid Mamchenkov","date":"June 7, 2013","format":"link","excerpt":"GRUNT - The JavaScript Task Runner Why use a task runner? 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