As an excuse to use this new keyboard, I was going to rewrite a part of the FileSieve documentation but then I realised I didn't do a blog post for today. So here I am.

Today was spent working on FileSieve and getting command-line automation happening.

As part of my App Framework library, the Parameters class provided all the functionality I needed to get things moving fast. It was simply a case of reiterating over the Parameters.List collection and performing commands (aliases are also supported) based on what was encountered.

Due to this iterative nature, FileSieve can executes multiple commands from the command-line in sequence. So, for example: you can select a profile, start it, and then select another profile and start that, even making changes to it - and only it - beforehand.

The first added command was Profile, which is used like so:

-profile="My Profile"

This makes the GUI select the My Profile profile and make it active. All following commands are then executed on that profile.

Most of the commands emulate using the application's interface, such as RadioButton.PerformClick(). There's additional sanity-checking in there as it's accepting input from the user, but there really isn't much to it.

I did wonder about adding generic automation to the App Framework for all of my software, but it'll still take manual work to specify what's what. Probably isn't worth it, to be honest. Although I think Wake On LAN Ex will benefit from automation.

The 4.22 release will feature additional commands that aren't critical to using FileSieve from the command-line.

Oh, speaking of the command-line: the nomenclature has been changed from Command-Line to Automation. The reason being that I'd like to also add support for automating FileSieve usage via a text file. It'll basically be a top-to-bottom list of commands and parameters that FS iterates through executing one at a time.

To help with any debugging issues on the user's part, all automotive actions and their outcomes are logged under the Automation category in the Log window.

FileSieve 4.21 is available from FileSieve.com.