We use AI to build automation that gives you your time back. 🤖 Tools, training and custom work.
New here❓
Start Here
Discover Our
Courses
Schedule
a meeting
Downloads
Browse by Task
Testimonials
Using AI❓
AI Tools

Posts tagged "ahk news"

AHK News: Why I fired my son last Sunday❗

Howdy %Name%,

A couple of months ago I hired my son to help me edit videos and work on the-Automator business.

I was impressed how fast he was learning to edit videos and upload our AHK Hero Call summaries to WordPress.

But, like many people, he hadn’t learned to prioritize keeping the boss happy over “his wants”.

Don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t asking him to be like me.

During my junior and Senior years of High school, I worked ~ 60 hours a week. And, when I finished working my way through college, I frequently worked 80+ hours a week for Corporate America.

But the crazy hours I put in for Corporate America were mainly of my choosing and was mostly where I was investing in myself (learning to work smarter, not harder).

I fired my son because I felt he was “soft” and needed a “reality check”. (excuse the pun)

He can continue to live here while in College and I’ll keep him fed but he’ll have to fend for himself for money.

If he shows signs of realizing his poor judgment choosing to play online games with friends and leaving me waiting for him to work then I’ll reconsider.

The best part about being a Strategic / “Long-Term” thinker is that I don’t even feel bad because I know I’m “helping him“.

What do you think %name%, am I a “meanie“❓

Now on with the show…

Access all our Courses; Quit when you want

How AI can save you Thousands of Dollars and Reduce your Stress

I think most of us have used AI for some basic things but I came across a wonderful use case where AI can save you a crazy amount of money (and greatly reduce your stress).

Fittingly I used AI to create a video explaining how to use AI to save a fortune!

How to Use AI to fight Unfair / Complex Bills

Configuring New File Templates for AHK v2

During an AHK Hero call we got an interesting question about configuring a New File Template for AutoHotkey.

In this video Isaias walked us through how easy it is to configure multiple templates! It’s easier than you think!

Configuring your AutoHotkey v2 New File Templates

Greatly Simplify Your Code by Using Groups

Sometimes you want conditions based on multiple programs / windows etc. In that case using the Group methods can be a lifesaver! Check out how Isaias used them in this video.

Using Groups to Make your AutoHotkey Coding Life Easier❗

Using a Ternary to Simplify your Code

I was using Claude to create a tool. I’d given it our Notify class and told it I wanted a different notification based on conditions.

I have to admit I was surprised (in a good way) when I looked at the code.

We walk through it in this video.

Using Ternary with Notify

Improving People’s Lives: Story #69

A few months back our client AJ had mentioned he was tired of “buying new Stream Decks” because he kept killing his. We finally got the Hotkeys for 2^nd keyboard script working properly.

It needs more work before we share it with the general public but we got our client configured during a consultation.

Now he can map keys on a 2^nd keyboard to actions!

What we’re reading

Your Hard Drive is slowly dying – How to Make sure Your Data Is Safe
How to fix the most Annoying Things About Windows 11
How to block Internet access for Specific Android Apps

AI News that you Need to Know

How I used Copilot to share my screen (and have it show me where to click)
These free Deepfake AI tools are ridiculously good
Google’s new vibe coding AI Studio lets anyone build & deploy apps live in minutes

AI Superpower Guide: Know which to use depending on your task

⚡️Productivity tips: Just do 5 minutes

If you don’t want to do something, make a deal with yourself to do at least five minutes of it.

Usually, after five minutes, you’ll be up for doing much more!

A spot of Humor:

The best heckle I ever heard at the tennis!

What we utomated this week with AutoHotkey #109

This week we knocked out a bunch of client projects and I have to say, some of these solutions were pretty slick!

In this week’s video I walk you through things like our new long-press hotkey feature (which is way cooler than it sounds), bug fixes to our script maker tool, and how we’re helping clients automate their workflows in ways that would’ve taken forever to do manually. If you’ve ever wondered what kind of real-world problems AutoHotkey can solve, this one’s definitely worth a watch.

What we automated with AutoHotkey #109

Clients say…

The content is great in general and often questions can actually help and improve interest in AutoHotKey. — Rodrigo Costa

AHK Hero

Consider joining the AHK Hero club! Members receive 25% off courses, consultations, tutoring, done for you project work, etc. Currently we have over 484 hours of recordings teaching AutoHotkey that is exclusive to AHK Hero members❗

You can watch 1 hour a day for a year and not repeat content! That’s a lot of AHK Learning!

During this Friday’s call we’re planning to discuss:

Help AHK Hero Members with their Questions & Code
Regular Expressions: Differences between AHK and RegEx101
API call to Google Sheets
Using an Edit Field to Filter a list
Using a Ternary to easily apply changes based on logic (instead of using if)
Update on Hotkeys for 2^nd Keyboard
Using SendTo for passing multiple files to a script
Script highlight: Windows 11 Context Menu Switcher

They also have access to exclusive & pre-released content and 3 hours a week where we help people with their AHK issues (the Saturday calls are geared towards people new to AutoHotkey.)

️ Quotable quotes

Burn the bridges back to mediocrity — Napoleon Hill
Learn a HotKey a day to keep inefficiency away! — Joe Glines
Whatever happens randomly can be made to happen on purpose — Dan Kennedy
Failure is not the opposite of success; It’s a part of it!

⏩SHARE WITH A FRIEND⏩

Do you know someone that would benefit from learning useful automation tips like the gems in today’s issue? Take a second and forward this newsletter and bask in the glow of their undying gratitude. Was this email forwarded to you?

Sign up for this Newsletter here. We never share your email with anyone. Ever!

The-Automator

Joe, Isaias, Irfan and staff

P.S. One of my favorite quotes is :

Hard times create Strong men.

Strong men create Good times.

Good times create Weak men.

Weak men create Hard times.

Many will not understand, but you have to raise warriors, not parasites.— G. Michael Hopf

AutoHotkey News 2025-01-30 It’s time to take back your life!

Howdy,

I was reading this article which estimated the number of hours wasted per day by Industry on mundane tasks.

So, my question to you is:

How many hours a day do you waste?

And what would you do with those hours you’ve gained back through automation?

Small businesses are increasingly turning to automation as a powerful tool to level the playing field with larger competitors.

In fact, 88% of small business owners report that automation enables them to compete more effectively by helping them operate more efficiently, reduce errors, and improve customer service.

As I’ve said before:

Knowledge is power. Automation knowledge is a Super-Power

If you’d like help, check our consultation prices and then book a call with us by looking at my calendar.

Now on with the show…

Running out of Hotkeys❓

Isaias and I were discussing a weird update to VS code. The update mentioned you could now “use the Insert key…”

Both of us were laughing because it’s one of the most un-used keys ever made!

I blocked the Insert key and Numpad Insert key at least 12 years ago with the following code:

Insert::Return ;Disable Insert command
NumpadIns::Return ;Disable Insert key on 10-key Numpad

But then I realized, instead of blocking it, we should repurpose it.

With that idea in mind we went on to demonstrate a few additional ways you can play with hotkeys to have additional actions. (Watch for long-press or double press etc.)

You can check them out in this video.

Showing mulitple ways to define hotkeys for an unused key on your Keyboard

Menus in AutoHotkey v2 rock❗

During an AutoHotkey Hero call a hero member wanted to learn about creating menus.

Isaias gave a great overview of how easy it is to create menus, sub-menus and add icons.

Learning Menus in AutoHotkey v2 [Excerpt from AHK Hero call]

If you want to learn more about GUIs you should consider our Intro to GUIs course.

There is over 4.5 hours of content broken-down into bite-size videos. And it, like all our other courses, comes with a 200% money back guarantee !

Improving People’s Lives: Story #36

I helped a client record tutorials. Unfortunately sometimes, due to background noise or low bandwidth, some of her lecture was garbled.

She’s very busy so, instead of taking up her time to “patch” the videos, we used Eleven Labs to clone her voice.

I was amazed that, when I swapped out the cloned patches, it was virtually impossible to determine which was her and which was her cloned voice!