Can anyone help, I am new to automator. on opening automator both the library and action is empty and there is no appliction list. How does one automate anything?
Is this the first time you have opened Automator?
Did you upgrade your OS X to Tiger just recently, or is your iMac fairly new?
You might want to trash your Automator preferences file and relaunch Automator and see if that helps. By default, it should bring up all available applications on launch.
The prefs file will be found in your
username/Library/Preferences folder and is called:
com.apple.Automator.plist
(just search for it)
Or, you might find the Install CD your iMac came with and reinstall Automator (if it comes with a separate installer).
I have the same problem: although Automator used to work fine, now everything is just gone and I can't even use my own workflows. It is also impossible to import any actions, be it from the automator folder or from any other folder that I downloaded actions to. There are no error messages displayed in automator, which prompts me to believe that this is a rather nasty bug. I have been searching around different international and norwegian forums, and the problem seems to be widespread (yet there is little or no information about what has been leading up to the problems). I tried all of the suggested tricks - trash the com.apple.automator.plist, reinstalled automator from the DVD, repaired permissions. If I create a new user, it will work fine (and no, I didn't change the user name for the my own account). I'll continue hoping that somewhere there is a top-notch user holding the secret key combination that will solve this mystery...
Another guy though that Filevault was causing the trouble, but if that is the case I can't see any reason why there should only be problems with automator and why they should persist across reinstalls and restarts.
I had the same problem myself, but just learned from another thread that if you go to your folder/Libraby/Caches and then delete com.apple.automator.actioncache automator will reset and you'll see your actions in the action pane.
There should be a way to somehow merge threads on the same subject; I believe it would make it a lot easier to find advice when you search old threads.
