Automator - an Automation Manager

Automator main window

The Automator is composed of a list of Scripts (left hand column), a run progress bar, a set of over-sized Run controls buttons and a panel that shows a summary description of the current selected Script.

Run status information above the progress bar indicates: Step currently executing and number of steps, the name of the Sound Item that is playing, the play time position and the total time length of the Sound Item. The progress bar indicates step progress for the Script (not the play time position).

Edit Script menu

The Edit Script Menu has the following functions. Some edit funtions use an Automator 'clipboard' similiar to the Windows clipboard, but they do not affect the contents in the Windows clipboard. The list is renumbered when actions add, delete or move items in the list.

• Edit Script  - Loads the selected Script into the Script Editor.
• Undo Cut  - Restores a previously cut Script from the Undo stack.
• Delete  - Deletes selected Script from the list. Deletes cannot be restored and are not placed in the clipboard or on the Undo stack.
• Cut  - Deletes selected Script from the list. Replaces the contents of the clipboard and saves the cut item on Undo stack.
• Copy  - Copies selected Script into the clipboard.
• Paste  - Pastes a Script from the clipboard to the Script list at the selected position. The list is renumbered. A sequential index number is added to the end of the Script Name to make it unique.
• New Script  - Adds a new Script to the Script list at the selected position. The new item will be populated with the current Default values.
• New Play All Script  - Adds a new Script to the Script list at the selected position. It will be pre-populated with Play Steps for all Sound Item in the Sound List.
• Move Up  - Moves a Script up one position in the list.
• Move Down  - Moves a Script down one position in the list.
• Favorite Script Attributes  - Set Selected from Favorites set the values of the current selected Script from your Favorites. Save Selected as Favorites saves the values of the current selected Script as your Favorites. Script steps are not included with Favorites. Use Copy if you want to copy steps as well.
• Set Time Overlap on All Play Steps  - Set all Play Steps in the selected script so that they overlap by a specified amount of time. The Overlap time amount is specified in the Options -- Automation tab. So for example, if you specify 10 seconds of Overlap, when a sound item reaches 10 seconds from the end of its play time, the next Play Step starts to play. This is useful if you want a music track to begin fade-in while the previous music track fades out. The Fade markers are set in the Sound Item Attributes.
  
  Note: Overlap accomplished by assigning an Offset Time all Plays Steps. Offset times are calculated when you start the script. Pausing the script with Offset steps will throw off the timing and produce undesired results. Also, this only works on simple scripts that contain only Play Steps. Introducing Delays or Run Script Steps (any step that takes time to execute) will likely throw off the timing and cause undesired results.

Announcements menu

These menu items provide a productivity aid for you to quickly create different types of Announcement and Music scripts from your Sound Items. You can create the Script Using All Sound Items or select a subset of Sound Items by clicking the Using Selected Sound Items menu item. You could use the Script Editor to create any of these scripts but these menu items offer a quick method to ensure all the necessary settings are set. When the script is marked as any type of Announcements, all Play steps in the script are treated as Preemptive. You can also set a master Pre-Delay and Post-Delay for all Announcements in the Options dialog Automation tab.

• New Script - Insert Announcements  - Creates a Script of Insert Announcements with one Play step for each selected Sound Item.
• New Script - Interval Announcements  - Creates a Script of Interval Announcements with one Play step for each selected Sound Item. The Interval is set from the interval time amount is specified in the Announcements Interval Time in the Options dialog Automation tab. You can change the interval time on each Script.
• New Script - Offset Timed Announcements  - Creates a Script of Offset Timed Announcements with one Play step for each selected Sound Item. Play step Offset times are set to increments of the interval time mentioned above. Once created, you can use the Script Editor to adjust each step Offset.You can theUse this option
• New Script - Scheduled Announcements  - Creates a Script of Scheduled Announcements with one Play step for each selected Sound Item. The first step is scheduled at the Scheduled Time in the Options dialog Automation tab. Subsequent steps are scheduled in increments of the interval time mentioned above.
• New Script - Music Selections  - Creates a Script of Music Selections with one Play step for each selected Sound Item.

View menu

• Toolbars  - Toggle visibility (show/hide) of each Automator toolbar .

Actions menu

• Run Script, Stop, Pause and Resume  - Perform these actions for the current selected Script.
• Play Next  - Plays the next Step in the Script. Stops all playing sounds in the Script first.
• Refresh List  - Refreshes the list to pick up recent edits made to the Sound List. This is performed automatically when the user changes focus to the Automator window. The Automator log will be updated with any errors found during the refresh.
• Stop All Scripts  - When clicked, all Scripts currently running are stopped including the scheduler Scripts.
• Run Script on Click  - When checked, a selected Script will run by pressing the Enter key, Space bar or clicking it with the mouse.

Tools menu

• View Automator Log  - Show the contents of the Automator log file which contains error messages and time stamps for operation performed.
• Reset Automator Log  - Resets the log clearing all old messages.
• Generate Report  - Generates a Sound Plot report or all Sound Items and Scripts.

Scheduler menu

Discussed on the Scheduler Help page.

Notes: Each Script has an internal unique Id. Two Scripts may have the same name but will have different Ids. You can expose the Ids from the Sound List window Options dialog (usually only done for diagnostic reasons).