Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#201

Post by jpeeler » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:18 PM UTC

santaclaus wrote: post #86

In college I wrote a script to register for classes. I'd input the potentially-full classes I'd like to register for, and it would just hammer the registration site repeatedly until someone removed themselves from the class at which point I'd be registered. I'm still amazed IT didn't pull the network connection to my dorm room or have any kind of rate limiting. No 8am sessions for me!

Similarly the college I attended required a five or six (can't remember now) digit number required for access to class registration. The idea was that you would talk to your advisor beforehand so you didn't sign up for the wrong thing I guess. My advisor seemed to be pretty uninterested in meeting with me over email (never responded to multiple attempts), so I gave up and brute forced it.

Class registration was done by most with the web interface, but I opted to connect to the backing mainframe via a 3270 terminal emulator. Doing so allowed me to write a simple expect script passing in an increasing number as fast as the connection would allow. I didn't bother with rate limiting and am surprised nobody noticed. Took me about 30 minutes and I was in! I was able to use that script at least twice and I wished I had thought of writing it sooner.

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#202

Post by throwaway613834 » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:18 PM UTC

Checking the weather. I have a script that checks the temperature and notifies me via email if it's going to be too hot in the next couple of days. (I haven't found a web service that allows customizing the notification thresholds.)

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#203

Post by codegeek » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:19 PM UTC

artpi wrote: post #102

I have set up a battery of scripts on google app engine and Im pretty happy with it. 1. I have a script to automatically buy small amount of BTC every day 2. For the more knowledge-dense books I read, I write summaries of them ( https://piszek.com/books/ ). I have a script that puts a random book review to my pocket for reviewing every week 3. I have an instagram account of lego minifig ( https://www.instagram.com/le…

#7 is genius. For lazy folks like me, that is a great way of wishing people bdays :)

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#204

Post by sleighboy » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:19 PM UTC

OkGoDoIt wrote: post #173

sleighboy wrote: post #109

The grocery chain I shop at has a component of their loyalty card that lets you add certain coupons to your card and they change constantly. All told there may be a few hundred of items offered up daily, most of which I don't buy anyhow. So instead of wasting my time sifting through them to save $10 a month I just wrote a script to add all of them to my card every day at the same time. So long as I go shopping after…

Safeway does the whole digital coupon thing. It’s too much of a hassle to be worthwhile but this could help. Not sure it’s worth the effort of writing the script myself though. Do you mind open sourcing it?

https://gist.github.com/danielatdattrixdotcom/bd6a05e3d8c499...

Edit Update: Gist is fixed and working 100%

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#205

Post by wynnvonn » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:19 PM UTC

Dodging the f*ing lightning in the desert area of FFX. I remember spending hours in that section as a kid, never managing to dodge more than 20 bolts in a row... When it came out for PC, it was time for revenge!

I captured video input with a simple python+QT script and emitted a button-press whenever the screen flashed. The best part was that the script didn't interfere with my controller - I could run around the area opening chests / battling in random encounters, racking up dodges all the while. Sure - a memory editor would have had the same effect in 5% of the time - but this was _way_ more rewarding.

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#206

Post by zeronight » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:20 PM UTC

vollmond wrote: post #155

1. IFTTT turns off all of my Hue lights at sunrise (task: turn off forgotten lights) 2. At one point last year, I felt that my mornings were getting slower and slower (causing me to leave later), so I set up a Dash button where I hang my keys. When I left for work, I'd press the button, and the script would log the time to a Sparkfun data feed. After a month, I reviewed it to see just how bad it was (pretty bad). (ta…

I recently got three lifx lights and they are bright enough to light my entire room.

Simply having them turn on at sunset is awesome. Such a small but great convenience.

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#207

Post by glitcher » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:20 PM UTC

LukeLambert wrote: post #124

colemannugent wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say it counts. My favorite filter is anything containing "unsubscribe" goes to a "Mailers" folder never to be seen. I don't understand how people can deal with having unread emails in their inbox all the time.

Am I the only one who clicks the unsubscribe link? I live by Inbox Zero and I've been giving out my email address for over a decade (500+ sites and services in 1Password), but I very rarely receive marketing emails because I always unsubscribe. In the US, it's a law that businesses must comply with opt-out requests. Do most people feel their inbox is too far gone to manage manually?

Unsubscribe has worked great for me too. I was not familiar with the phrase Inbox Zero before, but that is exactly how I maintain my primary email address I use for almost everything now. I typically only receive a handful of emails each day.

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#208

Post by cefthurston » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:20 PM UTC

Working on a script to automatically compile the best threads from HN each day and email. Might also send to pocket so I can read on my commute. Will go by thread count and screen out keywords in header to avoid topics I'm not interested in.

I find the most valuable thing in HN are the conversations in comments (sometimes also the least valuable thing, too).

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#209

Post by cloin » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:20 PM UTC

1. A script that pulls the subject of the meetings on my calendar for that day and creates a doc of the same name in a folder on my Drive. At the end of the day, if the doc is unchanged, it deletes the doc. If the doc has changed, it places it in an archive folder to make room for tomorrow's meetings. This encourages me to take notes because my doc has already been created and it's easy to get to. (Shoot this is a work task but I'm still proud of it)

2. Created 4 labels for Gmail: Archive/After 2 days, Archive/After 8 days, Delete/After 2 days, Delete/After 8 days with filters that apply those labels to filtered messages. Created a Google Sheet with a GApps script attached that takes those labels and deletes or archives after the messages expire. Handy to keep the inbox clean.

Re: Ask HN: What non-work task have you automated?

#210

Post by throwaway613834 » Wed, Oct 11, 2017, 8:21 PM UTC

marvinpinto wrote: post #190

throwaway613834 wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Holy cow, I've been looking for this but for the US. Anybody know of any?

If you're up for it, you can add your own bank/creditcard company/whatever as a plugin to it - I think the examples there are decent. I could also help if need be!

Haha thanks! The problem is in the US most banks would need screen-scraping; they don't have APIs, so it's a lot more work to do such a thing.