I'm doing a workshop in the UK at a library tech unconference-style event (Pi and Mash http://piandmash.info) on automating computer based tasks.
I want to cover tools that are usable by non-programmers and that would work in a typical library environment. The types of tools I'm thinking of are:

MacroExpress
AutoHotKey
iMacros for Firefox

While I'm hoping workshop attendees will bring ideas about tasks they would like to automate the type of thing I have in mind are things like:

Filling out a set of standard data on a GUI or Web form (e.g. standard set of budget codes for an order)
Processing a list of item barcodes from a spreadsheet and doing something with them on the library system (e.g. change loan status, check for holds)
Similarly for User IDs
Navigating to a web page and doing some task 

Clearly some of these tasks would be better automated with appropriate APIs and scripts, but I want to try to introduce those without programming skills to some of the concepts and tools and essentially how they can work around problems themselves to some extent.

What tools do you use for this kind of automation task, and what kind of tasks do they best deal with?

Thanks,

Owen

Owen Stephens
Owen Stephens Consulting
Web: http://www.ostephens.com
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Telephone: 0121 288 6936