A lot of programmers, or programming enthusiasts, thumb their nose at IT staff who naturally push back on stuff like this. In their mind, to play devil's advocate, they're seeing IT as unnecessarily burdensome, and getting in the way of automation.
The IT staff are probably naturally welcoming to the general idea of automation. However, to elevate something up from an off the cuff script that's described as "depraved" to the level of an actual business tool that can be relied upon, is a HUGE time and money sink. Validation is a very complex problem as you have described. This is the difference between consumer and enterprise hardware. If business management isn't setting this as a priority for IT, and if IT is already overwhelmed with the "known" quantities of work, then it just isn't practical to officially adopt.
I see it like this: It takes 1 "effort point" for a data entry staffer to manually enter the information tediously. It takes 10 effort points for the same staffer to write the AHK script to automate it. (Good for the staffer, assuming there's no flaws, and their reward is a longer lunch break.) To truly validate an automation as a business tool would take something on the scale of 150 to 200 effort points and involve lots of conversation - assuming there even is a framework for new tool validation established that can be used. IT knew this and made the right call. If company management wants to adopt a new tool without research and validation, that can be reckless.
A lot of programmers, or programming enthusiasts, thumb their nose at IT staff who naturally push back on stuff like this. In their mind, to play devil's advocate, they're seeing IT as unnecessarily burdensome, and getting in the way of automation.
The IT staff are probably naturally welcoming to the general idea of automation. However, to elevate something up from an off the cuff script that's described as "depraved" to the level of an actual business tool that can be relied upon, is a HUGE time and money sink. Validation is a very complex problem as you have described. This is the difference between consumer and enterprise hardware. If business management isn't setting this as a priority for IT, and if IT is already overwhelmed with the "known" quantities of work, then it just isn't practical to officially adopt.
I see it like this: It takes 1 "effort point" for a data entry staffer to manually enter the information tediously. It takes 10 effort points for the same staffer to write the AHK script to automate it. (Good for the staffer, assuming there's no flaws, and their reward is a longer lunch break.) To truly validate an automation as a business tool would take something on the scale of 150 to 200 effort points and involve lots of conversation - assuming there even is a framework for new tool validation established that can be used. IT knew this and made the right call. If company management wants to adopt a new tool without research and validation, that can be reckless.