Automations and Modes Guide

This guide walks through making an automation, the templates, the options, and modes. What they can do is on the Automations and Modes page.

1. Open the Automations window

Tray icon > Voice Commands > Automations..., or say "show automations".

The list shows every automation with a check box (on or off), what starts it in plain words, its conditions, what it does and when it last ran. The buttons: New, Edit, Delete, Duplicate (the copy starts switched off), Run now, Templates, Log, Pause all and Modes.

2. Start from a template

Press Templates and pick one:

The editor opens with the template filled in and switched off. Change what you like, tick Switched on, press Save.

3. Make your own

Press New:

1. Name: also what you say to run it by hand ("run automation name").
2. When: pick what starts it. Details says what to fill in: a program (chrome.exe; the Program in front button fills in the one you used last), a time and days (09:00 weekdays), minutes, a desktop, a folder, a mode name. For "This monitor setup", press This setup while the monitors are connected the way you want.
3. Only if (optional): conditions joined with and, for example weekdays and 09:00-17:30 and plugged. Also: battery, 2 monitors, running chrome.exe, not running zoom.exe, desktop 2, meeting mode, not gaming mode.
4. Do: choose one of your macros, or write the steps, one a line: voice commands by their words (go to desktop 2, volume 30, start meeting mode) or macro steps (send:^s, text:Hello, run:notepad.exe, sleep:500). Pick steps... opens the step picker.
5. Options: Quiet (no note on the screen), Run steps that ask for a confirm without asking me first, Wait between runs (seconds), Countdown first (seconds; 0 = none).
6. Test run runs the steps now; Save checks the line and saves it.

The window writes one line per automation into the settings file (section [MacroTriggers]), and the Voice Library page Automations shows the same lines for people who like to type them:

end of day   = on manual => steps: save workspace; show desktop
projector    = on monitors connected only weekdays with quiet => steps: start presenting
battery saver = on power below 20 with cooldown 10 min => steps: volume 20

4. When a step asks first

A step that asks for a confirm when you say it (closing a desktop, closing all other windows, putting the PC to sleep, a command made of a variable) does not run by itself. A small card appears at the bottom right: what started the automation, every step in words, and Run it / Skip. It does not take the keyboard focus, ignores clicks in its first second, and skips by itself after a minute. If you ticked Run steps that ask for a confirm without asking me first, it runs without the card, except that turning off, restarting or signing out the PC always asks. When you run an automation yourself ("run automation ...", Run now), it does not ask: you asked for it.

5. Modes

Tray > Voice Commands > Modes lists the modes with a check mark on those that are on, and Modes... opens the Modes window.

• Start or stop: say "start meeting mode" / "stop meeting mode", "deep work mode for thirty minutes", "end the modes", or use the tray or the window.
• Make or change one: in the Modes window, New or Edit: for each setting choose leave alone or the value the mode sets; the volume is a number; steps when it starts and when it ends; minutes after which it ends.
• The built-in ones (Deep work, Meeting, Gaming) can be changed; Delete on a changed one puts it back as it came.
• Several at once: the newest wins where two modes set the same thing; when it ends, the older one's value comes back.
• What comes back: only what is still as the mode left it. A setting you changed while the mode was on stays as you set it.
• Automations on modes: When: A mode starts / ends, and the condition meeting mode / not meeting mode.

6. Pause, log, and troubleshooting

• Pause all in the window, or say "pause automations" / "resume automations".
• Log shows the last 100 runs and why one was skipped (paused, you were busy, it ran less than a minute ago, a condition did not hold is not shown as a run).
• It never runs: is it switched on? Does Only if hold now? Were automations paused by themselves after 20 runs in one minute (the note says so)? For a program trigger, the name must be the program file (chrome.exe, not "Chrome").
• It runs too often: raise Wait between runs, or add a condition.