Create Guide: Evaluating A New Automation Idea

[NivenPrasad]

Overview

We need to create website content with a mark-down approach so that development can be easily updated. This is the issue to create a mark-down file for the "Evaluating A New Automation Idea" guide.

Action Items

Content

• Write a draft outline

Product

• Paste mark-down for the guide instructions in a comment on this issue.
• Create a mark-down file for this guide and add it to a folder called _guides
  • Call the file a name with dashes that is as short as possible
    • name:
  • Add a header to the file and add the name of guide where it says title

---
title:
description:
status: coming soon
display: true
---

Resources/Instructions

Figma Board for 100 Automations Website Design
Automations Proposal Template

[NivenPrasad]

---

title: Self-Evaluating A New Automation Idea
description: Research and questions for helping you move forward with your automation
status: coming soon
display: true

Self-Evaluating A New Automation Idea

Try writing a short description that explains your automation

In just a sentence or two, explain the repetitive thing you have to do, and the benefit of automating it. Your description should be clear enough so that developers will understand what it does, but not use too much jargon so less technical users can understand how it might help them. Coming up with this brief summary can help you clarify your idea, so it may take a few iterations to refine it.

For tips on how to to this, read the guide for writing a description of your automation

See if there are already tools that try to solve this problem

Check major code repositories and developer communities (GitHub, StackOverflow, NPM) to see if there are already similar tools. If there are, describe how your idea makes things easier or takes a different approach. For example would it be more efficient, or unattached to another project?

Think of who your automation will help and what problems it solves

Describe who your automation will help and how. Also, consider what help you might need with your automation. Do you have the code and need an interface? Do you have a mock-up of your idea and need help with the code? Think about less technical needs, like writing and testing.

Consider the time your idea would take to develop compared to the time saved

Try to convey a sense of how much time it might take to fully develop your idea, and how much time your automation could save compared to how things are done now. Does it solve a small problem for a lot of people? A big problem for a few?

Start documenting your idea

Look at the guide for creating a good ReadMe and based on your idea, try to fill out what you know. This should help you understand what questions you'll need to answer as you develop your automation. If you've already started working on your automation, describe how you expect it to work (what triggers it, what the result will be) and what the requirements are (language, platform, dependencies).

[Olivia-Chiong]

Ideas to include

• Make sure it does not already exist
• Is it feasible?
• Time required to code it vs time required for the task

[superbunker]

Created placeholder document in _guides: Evaluating Your New Automation Idea

[superbunker]

Progress: Made updates above based on comments
Blockers: no
Availability: lookin' good
ETA: Draft seems pretty close to done

[Olivia-Chiong]

Change title to "Self-Evaluating an Automation Idea"

[superbunker]

Updated with suggested changes, and adding more items from the Automations Proposal Template

[Olivia-Chiong]

@superbunker to update this into new PR.

[NivenPrasad]

PR approved and merged. Issue now moving to Done.

[Olivia-Chiong]

We need to include a link at the bottom of this readme to Automation Proposal

[superbunker]

Just have to remind myself to do this -- will try to do it later today

[superbunker]

Q: The Automation Proposal link will open a new github issue with the template text in it?
A: Yes! Needs explanation in the guide of what will happen via the link

[superbunker]

added the following at the end of evaluation guide:

Propose your automation

Once you're ready, fill out the Automation Proposal which will add your automation as a Future Automations issue.

Made pull request

[Olivia-Chiong]

Fixed with a PR.