{"topic":{"type":"topic","slug":"automation","name":"Automation","description":"What I cannot automate, I do not understand.","count":6,"url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation","feed":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation/feed.xml","notes":[{"type":"note","slug":"supposed-to-run-itself","title":"Supposed to Run Itself","summary":"After a year of building a fleet of AI agents at home, I think the models are the easy part, and most of what gets called agent engineering is a demo.","kind":"essay","published_at":"2026-11-02T00:00:00-05:00","revised_at":null,"reading_minutes":5,"word_count":1022,"series":null,"url":"https://waltspence.com/notes/supposed-to-run-itself","links":{"html":"https://waltspence.com/notes/supposed-to-run-itself","json":"https://waltspence.com/notes/supposed-to-run-itself.json","txt":"https://waltspence.com/notes/supposed-to-run-itself.txt","md":"https://waltspence.com/notes/supposed-to-run-itself.md","canonical":"https://waltspence.com/notes/supposed-to-run-itself"},"topics":[{"name":"Agents","slug":"agents","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/agents"},{"name":"Automation","slug":"automation","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation"},{"name":"Infrastructure","slug":"infrastructure","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/infrastructure"}],"tags":[]}],"thoughts":[{"type":"thought","id":"w2611a2","kind":"text","origin":"native","body_markdown":"Autonomy and authority aren't the same thing. Agents can do the work. Restarting the system should still take my signature.","body_html":"<p>Autonomy and authority aren’t the same thing. Agents can do the work. Restarting the system should still take my signature.</p>\n","text":"Autonomy and authority aren’t the same thing. Agents can do the work. Restarting the system should still take my signature.","published_at":"2026-11-01T12:00:00-05:00","original_published_at":null,"source":null,"original_url":null,"link":null,"reply_to":null,"repost_of":null,"url":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a2","links":{"html":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a2","json":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a2.json","txt":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a2.txt","canonical":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a2"},"topics":[{"name":"Agents","slug":"agents","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/agents"},{"name":"Automation","slug":"automation","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"backlinks":[]},{"type":"thought","id":"w2611a7","kind":"text","origin":"native","body_markdown":"Ask what standard practice is. Then ask what the gold standard is, and build toward that one.","body_html":"<p>Ask what standard practice is. Then ask what the gold standard is, and build toward that one.</p>\n","text":"Ask what standard practice is. Then ask what the gold standard is, and build toward that one.","published_at":"2026-10-23T13:00:00-04:00","original_published_at":null,"source":null,"original_url":null,"link":null,"reply_to":null,"repost_of":null,"url":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a7","links":{"html":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a7","json":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a7.json","txt":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a7.txt","canonical":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a7"},"topics":[{"name":"Automation","slug":"automation","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"backlinks":[]},{"type":"thought","id":"w2611a8","kind":"text","origin":"native","body_markdown":"If the text already exists, read it. Don't record the microphone to transcribe what the closed captions are already saying.","body_html":"<p>If the text already exists, read it. Don’t record the microphone to transcribe what the closed captions are already saying.</p>\n","text":"If the text already exists, read it. Don’t record the microphone to transcribe what the closed captions are already saying.","published_at":"2026-10-17T12:00:00-04:00","original_published_at":null,"source":null,"original_url":null,"link":null,"reply_to":null,"repost_of":null,"url":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a8","links":{"html":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a8","json":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a8.json","txt":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a8.txt","canonical":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2611a8"},"topics":[{"name":"Automation","slug":"automation","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation"},{"name":"macOS","slug":"macos","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/macos"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"backlinks":[]},{"type":"thought","id":"w2025a1","kind":"text","origin":"native","body_markdown":"I don't want an AI that does everything. I want one that tells me exactly what it did.","body_html":"<p>I don’t want an AI that does everything. I want one that tells me exactly what it did.</p>\n","text":"I don’t want an AI that does everything. I want one that tells me exactly what it did.","published_at":"2025-02-11T21:50:00-05:00","original_published_at":null,"source":null,"original_url":null,"link":null,"reply_to":null,"repost_of":null,"url":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2025a1","links":{"html":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2025a1","json":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2025a1.json","txt":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2025a1.txt","canonical":"https://waltspence.com/thoughts/w2025a1"},"topics":[{"name":"Agents","slug":"agents","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/agents"},{"name":"Automation","slug":"automation","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation"}],"tags":[],"related":[],"backlinks":[]}],"projects":[{"type":"project","slug":"zap","name":"zap","tagline":"A terminal-native, agent-friendly app uninstaller. Dry-run by default, Trash not rm, undo always.","status":"active","repo_url":"https://github.com/waltspence/zap","site_url":null,"started_on":"2026-08-20","last_activity_on":"2026-08-31","url":"https://waltspence.com/projects/zap","links":{"html":"https://waltspence.com/projects/zap","json":"https://waltspence.com/projects/zap.json","txt":"https://waltspence.com/projects/zap.txt","md":"https://waltspence.com/projects/zap.md","canonical":"https://waltspence.com/projects/zap"},"topics":[{"name":"Automation","slug":"automation","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/automation"},{"name":"macOS","slug":"macos","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/macos"},{"name":"Python","slug":"python","url":"https://waltspence.com/topics/python"}],"tags":[]}],"episodes":[]}}