New to the forums/Automating VPN Creation

[TheCannibal]

Greetings Everyone!!

I am extremely new to this software so I will be popping in to ask help from the AA experts.

Has anyone tried to use this software to Automate PPTP VPNs? I have to create at least 5 a day. We also are moving to a new location so there's another 300 I will have to do this for. I tried the recording part to run through the steps of creating the app. It will fail on some other people's machines because there are extra icons/in different places. I tried the Enable this task to run with other similar files or window titles but no go. This would brighten my day tremendously.

Thanks to all that can help!

[philkryder]

Originally Posted by TheCannibal

Greetings Everyone!!

I am extremely new to this software so I will be popping in to ask help from the AA experts.

Has anyone tried to use this software to Automate PPTP VPNs? I have to create at least 5 a day. We also are moving to a new location so there's another 300 I will have to do this for. I tried the recording part to run through the steps of creating the app. It will fail on some other people's machines because there are extra icons/in different places. I tried the Enable this task to run with other similar files or window titles but no go. This would brighten my day tremendously.

Thanks to all that can help!

I wouldn't consider myself an expert, but I've learn a few things that seem counter-intuitive, so I'll share them here.

Please note, I'm not trying to caste aspersions on the product. Some of this may be due to my mis-interpretation of what I observe.

Some things just seem "weird" like using F10 for "step over" but it really does a "single step" like F8 in VB.

My sense is that AA is made to be used by recording, rather than simply plugging in commands with the editor.

It "seems" that they do "a bunch" of stuff under the covers that works better if you just record it.
This was particularly noticeable when I tried to record individual chunks of a process.
It worked better to just record the whole thing rather than have small chunks.

Also, I tried to decompose the processes into subroutines and ran into some "strange" effects. Most notably, VARIABLES are re-initialized each time a sub-task is fired off.
You have to use the ClipBoard or a file variable to pass parameters into sub-tasks and return them.

Also, it is a good idea to keep Task Manager open.
You may see several "ghostly" copies of AA related processes running.
I'm not sure what causes them, but you may want to reboot periodically to "clean them out."

I just had a message from one of my Tasks "pop-up" even though I thought I had shut down AA over 20 minutes ago. It still runs in the system tray, but I thought I had shut down the tasks.

Give yourself some time to see how the tool works, starting with small processes.

There is a lot there.

[forumsupport]

Hello,

You can enable Moved Icons/Menus option under Tools->Options. Use this advanced option when desktop icons, quick launch icons or start menu items have moved. This enables the SMART automation technology to identify moved items and automatically adjust.

You do not need to re-record your script after enabling this option. This feature works in most instances, except for a handful of cases like opening control panel, printers etc. In such cases leave this option unchecked.

In addition, you can also specify a wild card character (*) at the end or beginning of the window title if your window title keeps on changing all the time. For e.g. you can write 'Microsoft Excel*' or '*Excel' etc. instead of providing the complete title if your title always keeps on changing. However, if you know the exact title of the window then we recommend providing the complete title to ensure that the actions are always performed in the correct window.

Tip: To make the task generic, use wildcards. You can use a wildcard at the beginning, end or both sides of the window titles.

Hope that helps.