What if the world was automatic?

The world would be easy, right?

Yes! It would.

But, unfortunately, the world can't achieve automation. Although, we could try to automate some things, and we've done that.
We've got automatic cars, washing machines, ATMs, etc.

These automated machines have made life easier for everyone.

Automation is something we need in every facet of life. In our homes, in our businesses, our daily activities, and, even on the Steem blockchain.
Yes, I said it. We need automation on the Steem blockchain.

And do we have it?

Yes, We do.

You will find out about it in this article.

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Alas! My trek on the Steem blockchain continues. My destination; undefined, My path; straight, My purpose; intact, My passion; resolute.

I've journeyed on the blockchain for over 2 months and counting. I've visited old people(older projects) and I've made new friends(new projects).

This time, my trail leads to an old friend(old project).

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Cut!!!!!

Phew!! For a while, I thought I was writing a story.

You thought so too right? If you did, that's great.

Well, I'm cooking a blog story about an Open source project. Expect it really soon.

This article is part of my "Steem Trek" series, which has seen me review different apps built on Steem.

In case you haven't been following the series, you have missed quite a lot.

So far, in this series, I've reviewed eight (8) projects built on Steem.
They are;

• Steemit
• Steemgigs
• Dtrip
• Steemwallet
• Steemer
• Steemplus
• Steepshot
• Dpoll

This series has been thrilling for me. I've learned a lot about these projects. Because to review them, I had to sit down and use them.
I also read articles published about them.

You might know some of them or all of them on that list. But, if you don't, this is a chance for you to learn about them.

I have published quality contents about those projects on the list.
Take time out to read them.

Links to those publications are available in the "Links" section below

In this article, I will be reviewing another project/tool built on Steem. That is; STEEMAUTO.

In my opening speech, I dropped a hint as to what I will be discussing in this article. That is; "Automation"
I also said automation is needed on the blockchain, and it has been achieved.
Automation on the Steem blockchain is possible with Steemauto.

You will learn more about the project/tool in this article.

Here are the talking points for this article;

• What is Steemauto?
• Review of its features(How it works?)
• Is it safe to use Steemauto?
• Summary.

Now you know the content of this article.

Without further ado, let's delve right into the discussion.

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Steemauto - Free and unlimited automation service on the Steem blockchain

Imagine we didn't have ATMs. We'd have to wait in long queues in the banking hall, just to get some cash.

Imagine we didn't have cars with automatic transmission.
We'd stress our hands and feet to drive ourselves to a destination.

Now imagine steemit without automation. You'd have to be available at all times to perform certain activities.

What if you didn't have to do everything yourself?

Let Steemauto do it for you.

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What is Steemauto?

source

The developer of this tool didn't give a description of the tool.
So here's mine;

Steemauto is a tool designed to allow you perform some actions on Steemit automatically.

That's just the straight forward definition of Steemauto. You will find out what the tool can do really soon.

Steemauto was developed by @mahdiyari, who is a Steem witness.

Steemauto is not a newly developed tool. It has been in existence on the blockchain for quite some time now.

Newbies on Steemit might not have heard of this tool though.
That's because the actions that warranted the use of its services are no longer common.

Back when the price of Steem was pretty high, there were lots of steem offline communities. What was common then, was curation trails.
We created and joined community trails so we could reward members of the community via upvotes.

It worked well while it lasted. Until the price of Steem hit rock bottom, and everyone abandoned ship.

Offline communities are becoming extinct now. I don't know about communities in other countries, but, in Nigeria, must of them are dead.
Sadly, the offline community I was a part of, is dead too.

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Review of Steemauto's functions.

In this section, I will be reviewing the functions Steemauto was designed to perform.

Steemauto tool is accessed via a website. It is not a browser extension, neither is it an app that can be installed.
This makes it flexible because you can access the tool from whatever device you are with at that moment. So far the device has a browser and an internet connection.

When you access the website, you are required to login.

Without logging in, you can't access the app's services.

When you have done the necessary process, you now have access to the following functions;

Curation trail.

Creating or joining a curation trail is one of the major reasons why people use Steemauto.
I came to know about Steemauto because of this feature.

Like I earlier stated, offline communities utilized this feature a lot.

I belong to an offline community on Whatsapp and Discord called "Steembees".

We made use of this tool to create a curation trail with an official account on Steemit; "@kingbee".

The trail was really effective then. We had over 200 followers. We were ranked at number 31 on popular curation trails.
You can be sure that upvotes from the trail were tangible. Well, not anymore.

Creating or joining a trail is really easy. It doesn't even take up to a minute.

Here's my curation trail I created.

It's a test trail though, but it wouldn't be bad if I had followers.

To join a trail, all you need to do is;

• Click the follow button on the trail panel and confirm the action. This shouldn't take up to 5 seconds.
• You can quickly search for the trail to save you the stress of scrolling.

But, that's not the only thing you can do.
You can edit your settings on the trail you follow.

You can set;

• Your voting weight.
• Time daily before you upvote

The image above is my own settings.

You could set your own voting weight to 100 percent, or 10 percent, or whatever amount you like.

Fanbase.

If you stay long on the blockchain, with time, you start making friends.
One of the resultant effects of friendship on the blockchain is; sharing upvotes among each other.

You could decide to upvote your 2 posts published by your friend. It could be more though.

Keeping up with this activity can be tiring though. It means you'd have to keep up with your friend's activities.

With Steemauto, you don't have to worry about checking out your friend's profile.
You can add him/her to your fanbase, and they will get upvotes from you: depending on how you set it.

I recently added @julietisrael to my fanbase. She's my best friend on the blockchain, and off it too.

She's one of the most active writers I know on the blockchain. She publishes several amazing articles daily. At least 3 daily.

I don't want to miss upvoting any of her articles, so here are my settings;

I set my voting weight to 100 percent and daily limit to 10. This means if she publishes less than 10 posts in a day, all those posts will be upvoted.

Aside from friends, you could also do this for your favorite authors.

Schedule posts.

Aside from curation trails, I think this is another feature that people use on Steemauto. That is; post scheduling.

You can create the post directly on Steemauto, which is cool.

The post editor is just like any other post editor on the blockchain. It supports markdown.

Furthermore, you can set post-payout or rewards options and set Steemauto as a beneficiary of your content. The beneficiary fee is not imposed on anyone though: It is optional.

After you must have done all the necessary things, you can then set your scheduled time.

For this feature, I think the developer needs to improve on the scheduler.

The schedule time range is too short. The maximum date you can set: is a week from the day you are creating the schedule.

I think the developer is playing it safe with users of this feature.

What if I set a schedule to publish an article next month, and the tool becomes defunct before then?

But, what if that isn't the developer's reason?

If it isn't his reason, it would be great to extend the scheduled time limit. 2-5 months from the current date would be great.

Aside from the issue of short time range, I had issues with not being able to set the time to publish the post myself.
It was a minor let down for me.
I will suggest this to the developer and hear what he has to say about it.

Aside from these minor issues, the feature is great.

Upvote comments.

This should be the least used feature of the tool. I'm not certain though. But, I doubt if anybody uses it.

As the feature title suggests, you can upvote comments of users on your post.
But, this is limited to users you add to your list.
This means you have to be aware of users who comment on your posts to be able to add them.

There's a fault with this feature. The fault has to do with limitations.
As I said, you can only set the tool to vote comments of users you added to your list.

This means if I get great comments from other users I didn't add to the list, they won't be upvoted.

Instead of limiting this feature, the best way would have been for me to set some parameters.

I can decide that I want to upvote the first 10 comments on the post.
This would definitely lead to spamming. But, the developer could come up with something to curtail spamming.

Claim rewards.

This is the most useful feature of the tool to me right now.
With this feature, I don't have to keep checking what time my post will pay out, so I can claim the rewards.
This tool does it for me.
Most times I forget a post has paid out, and the rewards claimed.
I only notice when I check out my wallet and find some tokens there. Then I realize that some rewards were claimed.

The tool scans your account every 2 hours if there are pending rewards to be claimed.
If there are, it claims them and transfers them to your balance.

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There you have it. All the services Steemauto offers.

It's good to point out that the app functions automatically. This means that; once you set whatever you want on the app, you can forget about it. The tool takes care of everything from there. You don't have to be awake, you need your device to be switched on, you don't need to have an internet connection.
The tool takes care of all that.

I know you might be feeling skeptical about this tool. Like how safe it is.

Is it safe to use Steemauto?

source

Yes, It is safe to use Steemauto. I'm sure you will notice when you try to log in that the tool uses Steemconnect security protocol.
Aside from that, the tool only has access to your posting authority.
You are assured of security while using Steemauto.
I have used it for a long time now and I've had no issues of security.

Summary.

In this article, I've been able to review Steemauto.
The tool is of great benefit to steemians who need some level of automation.
The current functions on the app are great. It wouldn't hurt to be able to do more with the tool though.
Maybe we'll get to see more features in the new version the developer is cooking currently.

The developer is currently working on a new version of the tool he calls; Steemauto v2.
He revealed this in a post he published two weeks ago.
The developer is a little tight-lipped about the features we'll get to see in the new version.
Well, we would figure that ourselves, when it is eventually released.
The developer said the new version will be released in 30 days from when he published that announcement. Two weeks have gone by, so we should be expecting the new version in the next two weeks.
I can't wait to see what the developer has in store for us, in the new version.

Thanks for reading!

Links section

• Project repository: https://github.com/mahdiyari/steemauto
• Project's page: https://steemauto.com/

Resources:

The content of this post was created based on my knowledge of the project, and mostly from my experience. The images used are screenshots of the platform on my device. Other images gotten elsewhere have their source links provided just below them.

Series backlinks:

• Steem Trek. (My Journey on Steem).
• Steem Trek (My Journey on Steem) Part 2.
• Steem Trek (My Journey on Steem) Part 3.
• Steem Trek (My Journey on Steem) Part 4.
• Steem trek (My journey on Steem Part 5): Reviewing Steemer, the first, free native steem android client.
• Steem trek (My journey on Steem Part 6): Reviewing Steemplus, the lightweight browser extension for Steem.
• Steem trek (My journey on Steem Part 7): Reviewing Steepshot, the Instagram variant built on Steem.
• Steem trek (My journey on Steem Part 8): Reviewing Dpoll; A poll app on the top of STEEM blockchain

Github profile:

https://github.com/HarryHeights