What Next?
Plastics? Try Scripting
by David M. Cole
Much like the advice offered Dustin Hoffman’s character in “The Graduate”—a friend of his father suggests young Benjamin Braddock’s future is held in the word “plastics”—I have one word for your future: scripting.
A common misconception amongst upper newspaper executives is that by bringing in a bunch of computers, you can achieve either workforce reduction or an increase in efficiency. The most common reaction amongst middle management after the implementation of a new computer system is to point out that there’s more work. “We need more people,” is a common mid-management muttering.
Both upper- and middle-management are correct, but neither have figured out the way to solve the problem. That way is automation.
Computers are designed to crunch numbers. How we got them to handle word processing, classified ad-order entry and page layout could be the foundation for a small book. The point is that while computers have been customized to perform special tasks, the people at Microsoft, Adobe or Quark—or even industry specialists like Atex, Harris or System Integrators—don’t know what you do.
As I like to say, every newspaper is 90 percent the same as every other newspaper—in broad strokes. But when you get to the details—how you like to route copy, how you like to never use 3-point rules around ads, how you want sports agate to look—every newspaper is different.
The devil is in the details. And Microsoft, Adobe, Quark, Atex, Harris and SII really don’t care about your details (unless you pay them a lot of money).
The one person who cares about your details and knows your details intimately is you. You are the perfect person to make the leap from computerization to automation.
Your future is in scripting.
What is scripting? It’s a user-friendly (and I use that phrase advisedly) programming environment that allows you to automate tasks. What kind of tasks? Your details—making certain that when a display ad is finished, there isn’t a 3-point rule border. Lining up the sports agate just so. Details.
Now, when the word “scripting” is bandied about, most people think of AppleScript, the environment developed by the maker of Macintosh and bundled with the computer. AppleScript is the preeminent example of scripting, but there are lots of others.
Many of the proprietary systems of the ’70s and ’80s had similar functionality. SII’s GLOSS language, which controlled User Defined Keys (UDKs), comes to mind most readily.
In the contemporary world, Frontier from UserLand Software Inc. of Burlingame, Calif., offers a scripting environment for both the Windows and Macintosh operating systems. For many years offered as freeware, the company recently started charging for support and upgrades.
Further, Microsoft Word has “macros” which automate the ubiquitous word processor. Many functions can be streamlined with a good set of Word macros. (You may remember that in my July-August 1996 column I predicted that selling Word macros would become its own stand-alone piece of business; I was wrong because I didn’t stop to think that macros inherently are detail-oriented.)
And let us not forget Perl. Originally developed for the UNIX world, there are now compilers for both Windows and Macintosh. A free utility, Perl has adherents and supporters around the globe and has been the basis for many Computer Gateway Interfaces (CGIs) powering World Wide Web sites.
There are others, but you get the idea. Whether freeware, bundled with the operating system or an add-on, scripting applications mean two things: efficiency and work.
The work comes from someone on your staff (you?) having to learn the scripting environment and spend time and energy debugging scripts so that they run flawlessly under any circumstance (i.e., when the user does the wrong thing at the wrong time, the script should still work properly).
Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth, I learned the SII GLOSS syntax and built automation tools for my paper. Though especially good at agate—stripping out fixed spacing and replacing it with tab stops was a common function—GLOSS could automate almost anything that could be typed into a workstation.
I was chatting with a reseller of a Microsoft Word-based classified front-end system the other day, and he was going on and on about how they had developed Word macros that turned the hum-drum system into a screamer.
The future of newspapers is automation and the future of newspaper automation is scripting. Heaven knows what would have happened to Dustin Hoffman had he gone into plastics, but you’ll probably be out of a job if you don’t learn to script.