3 Tools to Hack Automation into Your Life with Your Windows Computer (Install These For Immediate Benefits)

Automating things on Windows computers had never been quite as easy as they have been on Macs.

That is starting to change.

As user oriented automation becomes easier and more popular Microsoft will be continuing to push into automation tools and systems (and third parties for Windows too).

Automate your Typing with TextExpander

This is a text expansion and replacement tool. I recommend it for Mac and although there are other tools that are similar for Windows (PhraseExpress, Breevy) the very feature that it’s cross-platform is why I prefer to use it on Windows. All my settings and snippets are synced across Mac and Windows.

Automate your Apps with Microsoft Power Automate

This is the equivalent of Automator on the Mac or more like Shortcuts since it’s available not only on Windows but mobile app too. There used to be Microsoft Flow that was very like Automator on Mac (or online tools like IFTTT) but is now a part of Power Automate. You build up triggers and actions in blocks between different apps and services. Unlike Automator (and soon Shortcuts) on Mac it’s not part of the operating system by default although it is a free download.

Automate anything You can Think of with Autohotkey

This is the nearest equivalent in Windows to Keyboard Maestro on the Mac. Like Keyboard Maestro the sky is the limit for what you can make it do and tasks it can perform. Unlike Keyboard Maestro it is all text script based so you need to have a little bit of programming experience to do it although this would be a good start to get into scripting/programming.

Power Automate is relatively new and since it is available via the Web too and wide-ranging in apps and capability it is worth checking if you use Windows at all.

Read this post and more on my Typeshare Social Blog