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nickdag

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jan 2, 2011
25
0
Hi all,
I have the follow commands which I want to run daily. I just want a list of apps which I have installed on my Mac.

ls ~/Applications > ~/AppsList.txt;
cd /Applications;
ls ./ ./Utilities >> ~/AppsList.txt;
ls /Library/PreferencePanes ~/Library/PreferencePanes >> ~/AppsList.txt;

I know this has got to be super simple, but what's the best way to have this done automatically and daily?

btw, In Automator I created an app which runs these commands. But, then, how do I get the app to run daily?

What's the easiest, easiest way to set this up?

Thanks,
nick
 
You could make a daily iCal event and in the alerts section of that event tell it to run the Automator action you made.
 
iCal option

Didn't know about the iCal option.

For aesthetic reasons (I don't want to see the event on my calendar all the time), is there another method you recommend?

And, I did try this just now in iCal, and it requires AppleScript. And, even though this is simple, I don't really want to figure out the appropriate syntax.

-nick
 
Didn't know about the iCal option.

For aesthetic reasons (I don't want to see the event on my calendar all the time), is there another method you recommend?

And, I did try this just now in iCal, and it requires AppleScript. And, even though this is simple, I don't really want to figure out the appropriate syntax.

-nick

Save your Automater action as an app then tell the iCal alert to "open file..." That should work.

Then make a new iCal calendar (File menu, new calendar, on my mac) and put the event in that calendar. Then hide the calendar by unchecking the checkbox by the new calendar.
 
Save your Automater action as an app then tell the iCal alert to "open file..." That should work.

Then make a new iCal calendar (File menu, new calendar, on my mac) and put the event in that calendar. Then hide the calendar by unchecking the checkbox by the new calendar.

Sorry, I must have fat-fingered something. I had tried that as well, but when I clicked on Other, iCal wouldn't let me select my app. But, now it does (I moved it to the Applications folder... perhaps that makes a difference?).

I thought of another alternative... I can set the app to run upon Login. It's not as frequent, but that's OK.

Thanks! Both these options will work just fine.

-nick
 
I checked automator but it seems to require the use of iCal, as discussed above.

I would probably do it the Unix way - use cron: http://www.scrounge.org/linux/cron.html

Sorry, I didn't find a better documentation right now. Cron ist installed in OSX. Just open a terminal and type "man cron" to get the built in manual. It would probably be useful if you combine the above tasks into a simple shell script.

Have fun!
 
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