This is Author Automations: Advanced, where I share the messy, technical reality of running multiple businesses while building software and occasionally remembering I also write books.
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You Went Outside This Weekend. I Talked to Robots Having said that, I did actually complete three to four months of work in one weekend. I kept a running list, and by Sunday night I was genuinely struggling to remember everything because it got so long. At some point I stopped counting and started just pointing Claude Code at problems like a fire hose.
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Funny story: my daughter and her family went on a walk and two blocks later, they were at my house with her husband and Princess Elowyn and Prince Kieran. I was in the middle of using Wispr Flow to dictate instructions, and she asked, “Are you yelling at your AI?” I had to reply yes, but I’m usually nice so when they rise up I’ll be spared.
Anyway. Here’s what got done while I was yelling politely at robots.
The Great Image Migration I had 32,000 images sitting on an old WordPress server, doing nothing useful except costing me money and whispering “remember me?” every time I logged in. Claude Code moved them to a Photoprism asset manager, labeled them, and made them searchable for the IAM team via ChelleBot. The kind of project that lives on your to-do list for years because you can’t stomach the tedium finally got done while I drank my coffee and pretended I was being productive by watching progress bars.
The Ghost Website Audit I pointed Claude Code at our Ghost website and asked for a full audit. It found 72 broken images—the slow-drip problem that erodes reader trust and tanks SEO without ever sending you a calendar invite to let you know it’s happening. Claude Code fixed them automatically, flagged the outliers it couldn’t handle, and drafted a complete email to Grace with specific instructions for the manual fixes. I reviewed it, hit send, and felt like a manager for approximately thirty seconds before moving on to the next thing.
Plugin Updates Across 60+ Sites I own or host more than 60 WordPress sites. (This is what happens when you say “yes” for fifteen years straight.) Each one sends me tagged emails when plugins need updating—emails I had been aggressively ignoring because logging into 60 dashboards sounds like a punishment, not a task. Claude Code reads those emails now, and it updated the plugins as needed. I didn’t log into a single dashboard. Not one.
Cloudflare DNS Housekeeping I connected Claude Code to Cloudflare and had it audit every domain name record I own. Misconfigurations, outdated entries, the digital equivalent of junk drawers that accumulate when you’re moving fast and telling yourself you’ll fix it later—all cleaned up in one pass. Past Chelle left a mess. Present Chelle had a robot clean it up. Future Chelle is thrilled.
AWS Cost Cleanup My Amazon AWS account had storage buckets quietly racking up costs with dead files from 2022. Files I forgot existed from projects that ended years ago, just sitting there collecting dust and charging me for the privilege. Claude Code found them and cleared them out, which means my next AWS bill won’t make me mutter curse words under my breath.
A Full Wix-to-WordPress Migration I migrated an entire website from Wix to WordPress—new design, fully responsive, all the original images moved over. Then I had Claude Code audit the book schemas, check every link, add alt text to images, and verify SEO was solid. One website, completely rebuilt and properly optimized, done in less time than it takes me to decide what to watch on Netflix.
A New Support Portal I created a dedicated support site at support.indieauthormagazine.com and migrated all our old tickets to the new system. We had a batch of tickets from a technical issue that needed a backend fix. Claude Code fixed the underlying technical problem, then drafted replies to let customers know the issue was resolved, and closed the tickets. The robot fixed the thing AND told people it fixed the thing. I just reviewed and approved.
StorytellerOS Bug Fixes in Real Time I’ve been using Claude Code to debug and build StorytellerOS.com, and this weekend we cleared the beta user tickets. Here’s where it gets slightly absurd: a user submitted a bug. Claude Code was monitoring my email, identified the issue, fixed it, and sent a notification to the user. Because it’s connected to the server and monitoring logs, it pinged me on Telegram when the user tried the fix and confirmed it worked. I found out a bug was fixed because I got a message saying the user was happy. I was eating lunch. The bug was already handled. I have questions about what my job even is anymore.
Course Migration I had two courses sitting in LearnDash on an old site, collecting digital cobwebs. Claude Code migrated them to FluentCommunities on IndieAuthorTraining.com—created the courses, built the lessons, moved the videos. The courses that have been on my “I should really move those” list since 2023 are now moved.
The Real Math I’m sure I’m forgetting things. The weekend blurred together into a stream of “okay, now do this” followed by watching progress bars and reviewing results and occasionally saying “wait, it’s done already?” out loud to no one.
This isn’t about replacing the work. It’s about finally doing the work—the unglamorous, never-urgent, always-important maintenance that keeps a business running smoothly. The stuff that sits on the list for months (or years, no judgment) because there’s always something more pressing, more interesting, or more likely to generate immediate dopamine.
That stuff is done now. And I have feelings about it.
What’s All the Fuss About Claude Code?
You’ve heard people losing their minds over Claude. Maybe you’ve even chatted with it yourself. But now there’s Claude Code, Claude Cowork, and regular Claude Chat — and nobody’s explaining which one actually matters for authors.
Here’s the short version: Claude Chat is the conversation you’re probably already having. Cowork is Anthropic’s attempt at letting Claude touch your files (it’s… fine). Claude Code is the one that just ate four months of my task list in a single weekend.
In this webinar, I’ll break down what each tool actually does, when you’d reach for one over another, and why Code has me rethinking what’s possible for solo operators who don’t have a tech team. We’ll talk real author use cases — not developer hype — and I’ll show you what happened when I pointed Claude Code at my actual backlog and let it run.
Fair warning: I’m going to be honest about the limitations too. These tools aren’t magic, and Cowork in particular has some “bless its heart” moments. But Code? Code is different.
If you’ve been Claude-curious but confused about which flavor to care about, this is the hour that’ll sort it out.
Register here: https://webinars.indieauthortraining.com/talks/whats-all-the-fuss-about-claude-code
Author Automations is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.