Hacker News with Generative AI: Automation

Retool Agents (retool.com)
The AI industry has invested $1 trillion to build the most sophisticated reasoning engines in human history. Yet today, we use them as glorified writing assistants — copy-pasting their output into the actual systems where work happens. This isn’t AI’s failure. It’s ours.
AI, Software, Productivity, Work, Automation
18 points by conroy 30 days ago | 0 comments
Show HN: Non-intrusive AI agent to automate email driven workflows (mxtoai.com)
Making AI agents accessible via email
AI, Automation, Email, Workflow, Software
44 points by satwik 31 days ago | 13 comments
Why AI hasn't taken your job – And any jobs-pocalypse seems a long way off (economist.com)
ALMOST EVERY week the world takes another step towards artificial super-intelligence. The most powerful AI models can do an astonishing array of tasks, from writing detailed reports to creating video on demand. Hallucinations are becoming less of a problem.
Artificial Intelligence, Automation, Labor, Economics
32 points by helsinkiandrew 31 days ago | 51 comments
Show HN: Rocketship – Open-source E2E testing that's self-hostable (github.com/rocketship-ai)
🚀 Rocketship is an open‑source testing engine that can verify complex, API-driven scenarios that are made by your customers— or your systems.
Open Source, Testing, Software, Automation
26 points by magius18 38 days ago | 5 comments
Robin: A multi-agent system for automating scientific discovery (arxiv.org)
Artificial Intelligence, Science, Research, Automation
151 points by nopinsight 38 days ago | 20 comments
Metal – stealth browser for enterprise automations (metalsecurity.io)
Security, Browser, Enterprise, Automation
9 points by erekp 38 days ago | 14 comments
Terraform MCP Server (github.com/hashicorp)
The Terraform MCP Server is a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that provides seamless integration with Terraform Registry APIs, enabling advanced automation and interaction capabilities for Infrastructure as Code (IaC) development.
Terraform, Cloud Computing, API, Automation
105 points by kesor 39 days ago | 21 comments
Agent2Agent – A Technical Deep Dive into the Protocol's Core Logic (hello-jp.net)
Are you still working yourself, or does your AI Agent already make your living? Just a couple days ago the Y-Combinator backed Startup Firecrawl published a range of job ads for content generation, coding and customer support roles. Nothing special, except that only AI Agents are allowed to apply to these roles. Firecrawl is ready to pay a monthly salary of 5000 USD to the best performing agent. Yes, this is happening and it’s 2025.
AI, Automation, Labor Market
5 points by jpoersc 39 days ago | 0 comments
The State of Open-Source AI-Powered Test Automation (alumnium.ai)
AI is quickly reshaping software test automation, with open-source solutions emerging alongside commercial tools. As a test engineer maintaining Selenium tests, I faced confusion about these AI options: what exists, how they fit my workflows, their capabilities, reliability, speed, and cost. Finding no clear answers, I researched hands-on.
Software Testing, Open Source, AI, Automation
14 points by p0deje 39 days ago | 2 comments
Four years of sight reading practice (sandrock.co.za)
I’ve been doing relatively frequent sight reading practice using an iPad app for four years. Here’s how I’ve automated some of the steps and what I’ve learned from the experience.
Music, Practice, Automation, iPad Apps
156 points by chthonicdaemon 40 days ago | 82 comments
Show HN: I built an AI sales agent that writes and sends cold emails for you (elevatesells.com)
Tired of sending cold emails and getting ghosted? Let your AI sales agent find leads, write 1:1 personalized cold emails at scale, and follow up—so you can close more deals without the manual grind.
Artificial Intelligence, Sales, Automation, Marketing
6 points by OutboundWizard 41 days ago | 10 comments
Software engineer lost his $150K-a-year job to AI and forced to DoorDash (yahoo.com)
AI obsolescence is “coming for basically everyone in due time,” says Shawn K, an engineer who went from earning $150k to being locked out of the workforce for over a year.
AI, Job Market, Automation, Gig Economy
5 points by namanyayg 41 days ago | 0 comments
Chauffeur Knowledge and the Impending AI Crack-Up (ryanglover.net)
Artificial Intelligence, Automation
15 points by rglover 42 days ago | 9 comments
Show HN: Workflow Use – Deterministic, self-healing browser automation (RPA 2.0) (github.com/browser-use)
⚙️ Workflow Use is the easiest way to create and execute deterministic workflows with variables which fallback to Browser Use if a step fails. You just show the recorder the workflow, we automatically generate the workflow.
Software, Automation, Browser Automation, Workflow Management
69 points by gregpr07 42 days ago | 23 comments
Show HN: Downloads Director – Auto-organize your Downloads folder by file type (ycombinator.com)
MacOS app that automatically moves downloaded files into folders based on their extensions. You can create custom rules (e.g., .jpg → Pictures) and apply them in real time or on-demand. It works in the background and supports both ARM and Intel Macs. Free to use. Feedback welcome! Thanks..
MacOS, File Management, Productivity, Software, Automation
6 points by freakynit 45 days ago | 1 comments
Brewhaha: Turns out machines can't replace people, Starbucks finds (theregister.com)
Starbucks, smarting from disappointing second-quarter earnings, says that trying to replace staff with machines was a mistake.
Starbucks, Automation, Labor, Business, Technology
8 points by PaulHoule 45 days ago | 1 comments
Show HN: Lumoar – Free SOC 2 tool for SaaS startups (lumoar.com)
Get audit-ready faster. Lumoar provides the essential tools your startup needs to organize SOC 2 compliance today, paving the way for seamless automation tomorrow.
Security, SaaS, Startups, Compliance, Automation
91 points by asdxrfx 46 days ago | 32 comments
IBM Replaced HR Workers with AI (entrepreneur.com)
Former employees at IBM were replaced with AI, the company's CEO confirmed earlier this week.
Artificial Intelligence, Business, Technology, Labor, Automation
10 points by geox 48 days ago | 3 comments
In praise of grobi for auto-configuring X11 monitors (stapelberg.ch)
I have recently started using the grobi program by Alexander Neumann again and was delighted to discover that it makes using my fiddly (but wonderful) Dell 32-inch 8K monitor (UP3218K) monitor much more convenient — I get a signal more quickly than with my previous, sleep-based approach.
Software, Monitors, X11, Linux, Automation
75 points by secure 48 days ago | 48 comments
Sofie: open-source web based system for automating live TV news production (nrkno.github.io)
Open Source, Software, Television, Automation, News Production
378 points by rjmunro 49 days ago | 53 comments
Amazon's Vulcan Robots Now Stow Items Faster Than Humans (ieee.org)
Amazon, Robotics, Automation, Warehousing, Efficiency
209 points by Luc 49 days ago | 283 comments
Detect and crash Chromium bots (castle.io)
We recently stumbled across a bug on the Chromium bug tracker where a short JavaScript snippet can crash headless Chromium browsers like those used by Puppeteer and Playwright.
Security, Web Development, Chromium, Automation
146 points by avastel 51 days ago | 47 comments
Preparing for when the machine stops (idiallo.com)
As developers, we constantly shift between these two modes. The longer we work in the field, the more we rely on System 1. Until the ground shifts beneath our feet.
Software Development, Artificial Intelligence, Automation
75 points by foxfired 52 days ago | 49 comments
Cloud-Based Cron Jobs (schedo.dev)
A better way to run scheduled tasks in the cloud. Write code, set schedules, and deploy with zero infrastructure headaches. We handle scaling, concurrency, retries, and more.
Cloud Computing, Scheduling, Automation, Serverless
8 points by isnotaname 53 days ago | 3 comments
Apple Shortcuts is falling into "the automation gap" (sixcolors.com)
Nearly three years ago, I wrote AppleScript: Shortcuts Bridge or Crutch?, questioning whether accessing AppleScript via Shortcuts on the Mac was a feature to be celebrated or a red flag, fearing that Apple would use the integration to postpone or never release many of the system-level actions that were missing from Shortcuts’ debut on the Mac.
Apple, Automation, Operating Systems, Software, Mac
111 points by walterbell 53 days ago | 79 comments
Show HN: I built a tool to automate repetitive tasks by recording my screen (clickrepeat.com)
Record once, automate forever. Our AI learns your workflow and executes the computer exactly as you would.
Automation, Software, Artificial Intelligence, Productivity
9 points by Bahushruth 55 days ago | 4 comments
Automatically add missing "async/await" keywords to your TypeScript code (github.com/stanNthe5)
This VScode extension automatically add missing 'async/await' keywords when you save a typescript file.
TypeScript, Programming, Developer Tools, Automation
7 points by theThree 55 days ago | 7 comments
When You Get to Be Smart Writing a Macro (tonsky.me)
Day-to-day programming isn’t always exciting. Most of the code we write is pretty straightforward: open a file, apply a function, commit a transaction, send JSON. Finding a problem that can be solved not the hard way, but smart way, is quite rare. I’m really happy I found this one.
Programming, Software Development, Productivity, Automation
5 points by stopachka 57 days ago | 0 comments
Show HN: Auto-fix your GitHub PR issues with Proton for FREE (proton.codes)
Stop wasting hours on code reviews. Let Proton automatically fix your code while you build what matters.
GitHub, Code Reviews, Automation, Software Development, Open Source
10 points by qualtrixAg 59 days ago | 2 comments
Ask HN: AI Replacing Engineers – Firsthand Stories? (ycombinator.com)
I keep reading about many companies moving to a model where they stop recruiting and replace human engineers with AI. Is anyone part of such a company that wants to share some firsthand experience? What changed significantly in your workflow? On top of the "clasic" GitHub Copilot and/or Cursor, any other tools/agents/automated workflows that are used to compensate for additional human effort? Are you 10x more efficient? Is the effort similar as before, but distributed in other areas?
Artificial Intelligence, Engineering, Work Culture, Technology, Automation
48 points by ludovicianul 59 days ago | 89 comments