Chapter 1: Introduction
Understanding why automation eliminates friction between you and your work
I've spent the last three months building autonomous systems with Claude Code. What started as manual tasks—waking my Mac, running scripts, monitoring processes—became a fully automated pipeline that runs itself.
Here's what I learned: Automation isn't about eliminating work. It's about eliminating the friction between you and your work.
In this tutorial, you'll build a Claude Code automation pipeline that:
- Automatically wakes your Mac at scheduled times
- Runs tasks without manual intervention
- Maintains system state across sleep cycles
- Logs everything for debugging and optimization
Why this matters: As a solopreneur or AI-native founder, your productivity multiplier comes from systems that run themselves. This tutorial teaches you the foundational pattern I use for every automation project.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this tutorial, you will understand macOS LaunchAgents and pmset scheduling, build a sequential wake automation system, implement error handling and logging, create reusable automation templates, and measure and optimize automation performance.
What You'll Build
A complete automation pipeline with:
- Wake Scheduler - Automatic system wake at 6pm
- Caffeinate Handler - Keep system awake for 30 minutes
- Sequential Tasks - Run second wake at 7pm for additional automation
- Logging System - Track all activity for optimization
- Control Scripts - Start/stop/status commands