i love tiger so far. but one thing i'm not impressed with is automator. last night i decided to fire it up for the first time and learn how to use it. i went through the help item and made the example workflow step by step, and it worked well. i thought "wow, that was easy, and the end result was great!"
then i wanted to try it out on my own, so i decided i would use it to do something i do often: import aiff files into iTunes, convert them to AAC, and change the file info. i set up the workflow like this: get selected items in finder, import into iTunes using AAC encoder, set info accordingly, and add to specified playlist. four steps in the workflow. the problem came with the fourth step. before i could even run the action, i got the beachball while automator loaded a list of my playlists from iTunes. i thought, okay, this might take a few seconds to load. five minutes later, i still had the beachball.
finally the beachball quit spinning and i selected my files in finder. time to play the action, but when i made automator active again, it reloaded all my playlists and took about another five minutes. it quit again, and i ran the action, but it gave me an unspecified error on the second (conversion) step. i looked in iTunes and it had converted all the files as i told it to, the action just crapped out after the second step.
i tried it again with the same results. argh.
maybe its a bit buggy or there's something going on with using iTunes playlists, but automator is the only thing that's been a disappointment in tiger for me.
then i wanted to try it out on my own, so i decided i would use it to do something i do often: import aiff files into iTunes, convert them to AAC, and change the file info. i set up the workflow like this: get selected items in finder, import into iTunes using AAC encoder, set info accordingly, and add to specified playlist. four steps in the workflow. the problem came with the fourth step. before i could even run the action, i got the beachball while automator loaded a list of my playlists from iTunes. i thought, okay, this might take a few seconds to load. five minutes later, i still had the beachball.
finally the beachball quit spinning and i selected my files in finder. time to play the action, but when i made automator active again, it reloaded all my playlists and took about another five minutes. it quit again, and i ran the action, but it gave me an unspecified error on the second (conversion) step. i looked in iTunes and it had converted all the files as i told it to, the action just crapped out after the second step.
i tried it again with the same results. argh.
maybe its a bit buggy or there's something going on with using iTunes playlists, but automator is the only thing that's been a disappointment in tiger for me.