17 Practical Python Scripts for Automating Everyday Tasks

Python is a popular language for automating repetitive tasks. The article introduces 17 useful scripts covering file management, web scraping, text processing, email automation, Excel handling, database operations, system tasks, image processing, network automation, data cleaning, PDF manipulation, GUI automation, testing, cloud services, finance, and natural‑language processing.

1. File Management

Sort files by extension:

# Python script to sort files in a directory by their extension
import os
from shutil import move

def sort_files(directory_path):
    for filename in os.listdir(directory_path):
        if os.path.isfile(os.path.join(directory_path, filename)):
            file_extension = filename.split('.')[-1]
            destination_directory = os.path.join(directory_path, file_extension)
            if not os.path.exists(destination_directory):
                os.makedirs(destination_directory)
            move(os.path.join(directory_path, filename), os.path.join(destination_directory, filename))

Remove empty folders:

# Python script to remove empty folders in a directory
import os

def remove_empty_folders(directory_path):
    for root, dirs, files in os.walk(directory_path, topdown=False):
        for folder in dirs:
            folder_path = os.path.join(root, folder)
            if not os.listdir(folder_path):
                os.rmdir(folder_path)

2. Web Scraping

Extract data from a website using requests and BeautifulSoup :

# Python script for web scraping to extract data from a website
import requests
from bs4 import BeautifulSoup

def scrape_data(url):
    response = requests.get(url)
    soup = BeautifulSoup(response.text, 'html.parser')
    # Your code here to extract relevant data from the website

3. Email Automation

Send personalized emails:

# Python script to send personalized emails to a list of recipients
import smtplib
from email.mime.text import MIMEText
from email.mime.multipart import MIMEMultipart

def send_personalized_email(sender_email, sender_password, recipients, subject, body):
    server = smtplib.SMTP('smtp.gmail.com', 587)
    server.starttls()
    server.login(sender_email, sender_password)
    for recipient_email in recipients:
        message = MIMEMultipart()
        message['From'] = sender_email
        message['To'] = recipient_email
        message['Subject'] = subject
        message.attach(MIMEText(body, 'plain'))
        server.sendmail(sender_email, recipient_email, message.as_string())
    server.quit()

4. Excel Automation

Read and write Excel files with pandas :

# Python script to read and write data to an Excel spreadsheet
import pandas as pd

def read_excel(file_path):
    df = pd.read_excel(file_path)
    return df

def write_to_excel(data, file_path):
    df = pd.DataFrame(data)
    df.to_excel(file_path, index=False)

5. Database Interaction

Connect to SQLite and execute queries:

# Python script to connect to a database and execute queries
import sqlite3

def connect_to_database(database_path):
    connection = sqlite3.connect(database_path)
    return connection

def execute_query(connection, query):
    cursor = connection.cursor()
    cursor.execute(query)
    result = cursor.fetchall()
    return result

6. System Task Automation

Manage system processes with psutil :

# Python script to manage system processes
import psutil

def get_running_processes():
    return [p.info for p in psutil.process_iter(['pid', 'name', 'username'])]

def kill_process_by_name(process_name):
    for p in psutil.process_iter(['pid', 'name', 'username']):
        if p.info['name'] == process_name:
            p.kill()

7. Image Automation

Resize and crop images using Pillow:

# Python script to resize and crop images
from PIL import Image

def resize_image(input_path, output_path, width, height):
    image = Image.open(input_path)
    resized_image = image.resize((width, height), Image.ANTIALIAS)
    resized_image.save(output_path)

def crop_image(input_path, output_path, left, top, right, bottom):
    image = Image.open(input_path)
    cropped_image = image.crop((left, top, right, bottom))
    cropped_image.save(output_path)

8. Network Automation

Check website status:

# Python script to check the status of a website
import requests

def check_website_status(url):
    response = requests.get(url)
    if response.status_code == 200:
        # Handle successful response
        pass
    else:
        # Handle unsuccessful response
        pass

9. Data Cleaning & Transformation

Remove duplicates with pandas:

# Python script to remove duplicates from data
import pandas as pd

def remove_duplicates(data_frame):
    cleaned_data = data_frame.drop_duplicates()
    return cleaned_data

10. PDF Automation

Extract text from PDFs using PyPDF2:

# Python script to extract text from PDFs
import PyPDF2

def extract_text_from_pdf(file_path):
    with open(file_path, 'rb') as f:
        pdf_reader = PyPDF2.PdfFileReader(f)
        text = ''
        for page_num in range(pdf_reader.numPages):
            page = pdf_reader.getPage(page_num)
            text += page.extractText()
    return text

11. GUI Automation

Automate GUI actions with pyautogui :

# Python script for GUI automation using pyautogui
import pyautogui

def automate_gui():
    # Your code here for GUI automation using pyautogui
    pass

12. Testing Automation

Unit testing with unittest :

# Python script for unit testing with the unittest module
import unittest

def add(a, b):
    return a + b

class TestAddFunction(unittest.TestCase):
    def test_add_positive_numbers(self):
        self.assertEqual(add(2, 3), 5)
    def test_add_negative_numbers(self):
        self.assertEqual(add(-2, -3), -5)
    def test_add_zero(self):
        self.assertEqual(add(5, 0), 5)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    unittest.main()

13. Cloud Service Automation

Create an EC2 instance with Boto3:

# Python script to manage AWS resources using Boto3
import boto3

def create_ec2_instance(instance_type, image_id, key_name, security_group_ids):
    ec2 = boto3.resource('ec2')
    instance = ec2.create_instances(
        ImageId=image_id,
        InstanceType=instance_type,
        KeyName=key_name,
        SecurityGroupIds=security_group_ids,
        MinCount=1,
        MaxCount=1
    )
    return instance[0].id

14. Financial Automation

Fetch currency exchange rates (placeholder for API calls):

# Python script to fetch currency exchange rates
# Your code here to connect to a currency exchange API (e.g., Fixer.io, Open Exchange Rates)

15. Natural Language Processing

Sentiment analysis with NLTK:

# Python script for sentiment analysis using NLTK
import nltk
from nltk.sentiment import SentimentIntensityAnalyzer

def analyze_sentiment(text):
    nltk.download('vader_lexicon')
    sia = SentimentIntensityAnalyzer()
    sentiment_score = sia.polarity_scores(text)
    return sentiment_score

The article concludes by encouraging readers to start using these scripts to streamline workflows, save time, and increase productivity.