  Tremendous research efforts have been invested in exploring and designing
so-called shortcuts to adiabaticity. These are finite-time processes that
produce the same final states that would result from infinitely slow driving.
Most of these techniques rely on auxiliary fields and quantum control
techniques, which makes them rather costly to implement. In this Perspective we
outline an alternative paradigm for optimal control that has proven powerful in
a wide variety of situations ranging from heat engines over chemical reactions
to quantum dynamics -- thermodynamic control. Focusing on only a few, selected
milestones we seek to provide a pedagogical entry point into this powerful and
versatile framework.
