AutoHotKey

My life has been changed.  AutoHotKey has absolutely captivated my time and efforts over the past three months.

AutoHotKey is a Windows-OS based macro-creation program.  You can create macros that send text-strings, perform mouse and keyboard events, open and close programs, search folders and files, delete files and folders, and so much more.  You can activate these events through hotkeys, hotstrings or compile the script into an executable (.exe) file which you can then sell for your own profit.

AutoHotKey is open-source and free, and descends from AutoIt - a once open-source (now closed-source) program (but still free).  It has been a great work utility in much the same way Excel macros (and VBA) have been, for me at least.  So, I obviously have to share this with the rest of the world.

The AutoHotKey website where you may download the latest version: http://www.autohotkey.com/

The Scite4AutoHotKey editor (which I use): http://fincs.ahk4.net/scite4ahk/

About the only language I am familiar with is Visual Basice by way of VBA (and just a little bit of Java), and I have found AutoHotKey to be fairly unintimidating.  It is a command based scripting language as opposed to AutoIt which is function based.  You can create many programs which are a few lines long, a couple dozen lines long or hundreds of lines long - depending on what you need, want and have a desire to do.

Take your time with it.  The Scite4AutoHotKey editor has a lot of tools for creating hotstrings, include the scriplet tool (like the Excel macro-recorder), message box creator, GUI-creator, etc.

The AutoHotKey help file (as well as the online document list) provide a good introduction to the language.