Automagic Forum

I am a new user. So far, Automagic has accomplished some simple things for me, but as I try more complex Flows, I am getting lost. I would appreciate some direction.

I get the concepts of Trigger, Condition, and Action. What appears to be invisible (or at least not on any menus that I can find) is functions! I know from stumbling around on my smartphone that there are numerous functions (math, trig, formatting, sleep, back, home, and on and on). Where are they on the webpage? I have looked, but cannot find them.
I find it easier to search on the webpage (Help, Base Concepts, Triggers, etc.) than my phone. The webpage does not appear to have any of these functions available…or at least I have not found them. Can you tell me if they exist and where? If I can find them, I will bookmark.

The forum is sometimes very helpful, but not very complete. Here are a few examples of my confusions.
• It would be nice to see examples of when to use sleep() and some guidelines for how long sleep should be set.
• How can I clear the screen after starting an app?
• What is the difference between running a shortcut and executing the flow that makes up the shortcut?
• What is the difference in Action-Sleep and Script-Sleep()?

While I would appreciate answers to these questions, the larger problem is that documentation is pretty thin. Can more Flows be posted? That would help a lot. Simple tasks are a good starting place on which to build larger flows.

For functions, and their corresponding descriptions, add a Script action (or an Expression condition) to a flow. From the button below where you enter the script, tap the most right one ("Function").
Alternatively, tap the "?" button at the right side of the "Script" field underneath "Action type". Though many functions are described in one single line only, it is generally enough documentation to use them.
After opening the "?" help, tapping the menu button opens a menu which contains an item "Download offline help" - I think it goes as html files into /data/data/ch.gridvision..../files/help but I'm not entirely certain whether the files there actually correspond to the downloaded offline help files, as i never opened any of those explicitely to look at them
Those Script actions and Expression conditions are, btw, the places where you're most likely to use those functions.
sleep(duration) one generally uses to temporarily keep a script from further execution, to proceed only after <duration> time has elapsed. duration is, for that purpose, set as long as one wants the script to pause. Asking how long that time should be is akin to asking how big a number, assigned to a variable, should be. Proper answer is probably "It depends on what you intend to achieve". sleep beats running a loop for delaying execution.
What do you mean by "clearing the screen" - return to launcher home screen? Turn display off?
Shortcuts: those can be invoked by some other applications, or placed on the desktop - generally by programs which don't know about "flows", and have therefore no idea how to run a "flow". Also, the contens of variable {trigger}, available within the flow, may be different, depending how you run the flow.
Sleep as action is an action, to delay execution of a flow, Sleep() as function is a function, to delay execution of a script/an expression. I suppose a script action, executing sleep(), is equivalent to action sleep.

Many thanks, Bushmills. That was quite helpful and informative.

I invite other forum members to add more to what Bushmills has written.

Thanks