Automation is customer service (with fewer apologies)

People think automation is about saving time. That’s a side effect. The real point is consistency. Customers don’t care that a task was “quick” — they care that it was correct, predictable, and didn’t require a follow-up email with the subject line Re: Re: Re:.

The best automations are boring. They run when they should, fail loudly when they must, and leave a tidy paper trail. If you can’t explain what it did last night at 2:03am, it’s not automation — it’s a surprise generator.

My rules

1) Automate the repeatable. If it happens often enough to annoy you, it’s a candidate.
2) Keep humans in the loop where reality is messy. Supplier PDFs are not a standard; they’re a cry for help.
3) Logging is not optional. Future you is a customer too, and future you is usually grumpy.

Also: if your automation depends on “nobody changes anything”, I have bad news about humans.

# If it breaks silently, it isn't finished.
if not logs:
    raise Exception("Congratulations, you've built a mystery.")