Automating tasks

Automating tasks can save you time and ensure consistent results for many types of operations. Illustrator provides a variety of ways to automate tasks by using actions, scripts, and data-driven graphics.

An action is a series of tasks that you play back on a single file or a batch of files—menu commands, palette options, tool actions, and so on. For example, you can create an action that changes the size of an image, applies an effect to the image, and then saves the file in the desired format. Actions can include stops that let you perform tasks that cannot be recorded (for example, using a painting tool). Actions can also include modal controls that let you enter values in a dialog box while playing an action.

Scripts are a sequence of operations your computer performs. These operations may involve only Illustrator, or they may involve other applications, such as word-processing, spreadsheet, and database-management programs.

Data-driven graphics make it possible to produce multiple versions of artwork quickly and accurately. Let’s say, for example, that you need to produce 500 different web banners based on the same template. Instead of manually populating the template with data (images, text, and so on), data-driven graphics let you use a script referencing a database to generate the web banners for you.

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