Is This Automation Possible?

Hi,

Just hoping to get a little advice please?

Basically at work We have a system in place to invoice people which is hosted on a third party website which is php
but all seems to be in java frames?.

To send out an invoice we need to log in to the website, go to the accounts page,
type in an individual account number and submit. It then sends us to the customer account page.
We then have to click on another button "statement" which pops up a pdf window which
we then have to print, close and return to the accounts page.

As you can imagine having to do this with 40+ accounts at a time is quite time consuming.

I am hoping to write a program to automate this, i type in a list of account numbers, and the program automates
the rest.

I am not asking for code on a plate, I am willing to learn this myself. I just need to know if this is possible and
what language would be best for doing it?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Regards,
Sam.

It depends mostly on how the site setup on how easily it can be done. You might be able to skip some steps if you can pre-determine information.

One approach would be to create a program to automate the process of obtaining the pdf. Have it generate the requests necessary to download the pdf statement and then download all the pdf's via the automation to a folder, then you can just print them all.

There may also be software out there which will let you create a type of macro that will repeat whatever clicks/keys you press. You could possibly use it to record the steps necessary to pull up a statement. I don't know of any such software off hand.

I would probably take the first approach, being a program. I'd likely use PHP for the job, though you could try something else. A simple language with easy to use network tools would probably be best.

Based on your description this sounds like something you could certainly program http://www.autohotkey.com/ to do.

Thank you both very much

Sam.