Summary

For a 1.0 release, Automator is an amazing tool. It provides a point-and-click solution for implementing workflow automation between many popular Tiger applications including the iLife suite. Assuming that the technology catches on with developers, we might be on the verge of a completely visual scripting environment in future versions of Mac OS X. In the meantime, what Automator can't do, AppleScript can. For applications that are natively scriptable, you can use their AppleScript dictionaries to explore all the capabilities they offer. For those that don't include scripting features, AppleScript's GUI scripting opens up automation to just about every piece of software on your system.