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From 9to5Mac:
With the help of the Apple Support website, users can find a lot of information about the Apple devices they own. This includes things like technical specifications, guides, and support articles. However, all this information used to be spread across multiple pages – but Apple is changing that with a new “Documentation” page.
I’ve updated my folder of Apple Support shortcuts to include a new “Show Apple Support documentation” shortcut.
From Issue 104 of my Shortcuts newsletter:
Welcome to Issue 104 of What's New in Shortcuts!
We're far out of the Apple Vision Pro hype cycle and WWDC tickets are in developers' inboxes already – however, iPad rumors are still swirling for May as well.
iOS 17.4 has been released, which brought new actions to Shortcuts for the Action button, as well a general stability that's been much needed – there are still Feedback reports to file for 17.5, however.
In the Shortcuts Catalog, I've been going deep on entertainment shortcuts, plus Mac window management on the livestream. Plus, I linked to many videos, app updates, and stories worth checking out.
Here's what's new in Shortcuts:
On Thursday, April 4th, I hosted an episode of Shortcuts Live with special guest Stephen Robles to discuss how the iOS 17.4 update makes Action button shortcuts more dynamic, Stephen's latest videos, and what's coming at WWDC.
Throughout the discussion, we also covered special techniques for If statements, potential improvements to the Podcasts actions, and future ChatGPT integrations, as well as filed "verbal Feedback" on issues we want to report to Apple.
Here's a detailed breakdown of what we covered:
- 00:00 - Waiting lobby
- 01:40 - Welcome to Shortcuts Live
- 02:05 - Introducing Special Guest Stephen Robles
- 03:10 - Exploring Our Approaches To Shortcuts
- 03:53 - Stephen's Filming Setup Shortcut
- 06:23 - Feedback: Shortcut Duplicates
- 07:13 - Stephen's Done Filming Shortcut
- 08:28 - Comments and Riverside
- 09:34 - Stephen's Action Button Shortcut
- 11:42 - Matthew's Action Button Shortcut
- 13:27 - Feedback: Switch Statements
- 14:16 - If Statements and Coercing Variables
- 16:59 - Rest of Matthew's Shortcut
- 19:39 - Stephen's Low Volume Automation
- 21:22 - Tweaking Shortcuts for If Booleans
- 24:48 - Find Actions Broken For Third Parties
- 26:02 - Toggle Home Accessory Action For Shortcuts
- 31:22 - Feedback: Shortcuts Actions Hidden From List
- 32:07 - Find Mail Action Added, Now Missing
- 35:31 - Unpacking iOS 17.4's New Orientation and Activity Actions
- 37:02 - Freezing Issues; Skip Ahead
- 37:44 - Get Orientation and Super Mute
- 38:48 - Freezing Issues; Skip Ahead
- 39:14 - Set Silent Mode
- 39:44 - Landscape for Camera
- 41:36 - Freezing Issues; Skip Ahead
- 42:54 - Get Orientation; If Text Contains
- 45:14 - Call App Shortcuts By Name
- 45:26 - Blackmagic Camera App Shortcuts
- 46:50 - Experimenting with Orientation-Based Camera Shortcuts
- 47:21 - Testing Stephen's Orientation Shortcut
- 47:37 - Stop Shortcut To Optimize Action Button Flow
- 49:17 - Exploring Podcast Playback Shortcuts
- 54:23 - Innovative Uses of Physical Activity Shortcuts
- 56:41 - Deep Dive into Podcast Episode Details and Workouts
- 1:11:21 - Apple Podcasts OPML
- 1:17:47 - Exploring AI Actions and the Potential of ChatGPT in Shortcuts
- 1:24:54 - Reflecting On Programming and Potential of Shortcuts
- 1:32:16 - Thank You and Goodbye
A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of seeing Wicked Little Letters in theaters ahead of release thanks to Regal Cinemas’ Mystery Movies, a series they put on that lets fans buy $5 tickets to an unknown movie (usually an upcoming film).
Now, for April 2024, they’ve put out tickets for three more Monday Mystery Movie nights, each linked below – I just happened to be checking their site out and these aren’t even listed on the main portal yet:
If you’re subscribed to Regal Unlimited like I am, you can get the tickets “free” with your pass.
Plus, if you want to check out Mystery Movies in the future, you can use my shortcut that takes you back to the bookmarked page.
Check out Monday Mystery Movies from Regal and check out my folder of Regal Cinemas shortcuts.
I've just added a new folder to the Shortcuts Library — my set of Regal Cinemas shortcuts:
- Show my Regal Unlimited Card: Opens the Regal website to your Unlimited account page so you can tap to reveal the QR code for your card number.
- Show my Regal orders: Opens the Regal site to your orders so you can see past or upcoming tickets.
- Open Regal cinemas site: Opens the main Regal Cinemas website to show curated categories like Now Playing, Coming Soon, Saturday Morning Kids Flicks, and Limited Engagement pictures.
- Show Regal movies: Opens the “Movies” page of Regal Cinemas so you can see current, upcoming, and special release films that are available to buy tickets for.
- Show Regal theaters: Opens to a page of nearby theaters available from Regal Cinemas.
- Browse my favorite Regal theaters: Presents a menu of your favorite nearby theaters, then opens the corresponding URLs for that theater so you can buy tickets.
- Open Regal Mystery Movies: Opens the site for Regal Cinemas’ Mystery Movies, where they show an upcoming film without releasing which movie it is ahead of time.
- Show my Regal account: Opens the main Account page of your Regal Cinemas profile, where you can log in and see an Overview of your past upcoming & past books, plus rewards status.
- Show Regal promotions: Opens the Regal cinemas Promotions page where you can see new categories, current promos, available upgrades, and special engagements.
- Open Regal Crown Club: Opens the Regal Crown Club site where you can see your credit balance, check out featured rewards, order gift cards, and link out to even more member deals.
- Show Regal value days: Opens the Regal cinemas Promotions page for Value Days to see prices and days for low-cost tickets at your nearby theaters.
- Show Print and Poster rewards: Opens the Regal Crown Club rewards for items like movie posters and special prints.
- Show Regal store: Opens the Regal Cinemas store where you can buy branded merch from current movies or the Regal brand itself.
- Show Merchandise rewards: Opens the Regal Crown Club merchandise page where you can see physical products for sale like the Dune or Ghostbusters popcorn buckets.
- Show Concessions and Ticket rewards: Opens the Regal Crown Club section for Concessions and Ticket rewards, like discounts on popcorn or free passes/upgrades.
- Open Regal TV: Opens the Regal Cinemas app on the selected Apple TV, then shows the Remote so you can navigate.
Check out the folder of Regal Cinemas shortcuts on the Shortcuts Library.
From Stephen Robles on YouTube:
Learn how to build 15 iPhone Shortcuts, inspired by YOU. Automatically play music when an alarm is snoozed, schedule a text to auto-send, make your screenshots look pro, and more.
Stephen continues his Shortcuts series on YouTube by building shortcuts off listener requests – a great watch as always.
After leaving her position as CEO of Yahoo in 2017, former Google employee No. 20 Marissa Mayer is back with a new group photo sharing app called Shine from her company Sunshine, aimed at solving the “send me that photo” problem according to her Twitter thread around the new release.
With Shine, you create an album for a time and place, choose the type of selection process, and then share with other people – the selection part is where the “magic” happens, since Shine lets you optionally let AI select the best photos for you (or you can choose manually). Shine can also suggest albums automatically after-the-fact too.
The “Magic Mode” automatically uploads the best photos identified by AI as they’re taken, and when in manual mode you’ll still get suggestions but the app lets you approve them before sharing.
Shine lets you share photos in full resolution, automatically removes duplicates, and lets viewers download the photos from the app or see them with an album code, link, or QR code.
The app also has comments and reactions built right in, turning each album into a psuedo-social network for each event. After the event, these interactions are shared into an Activity feed, making the entire app a feed of comments around event’s you’ve attended.
Shine looks super interesting as a Minimum Viable Product from Marissa Mayer’s team, not only because it seems to truly take a honest stab at solving this problem well, but also because it’s backed by a powerhouse in the tech space. Right now there’s only an iPhone app and no web interface, and some of the design leaves a little to be desired (the app generally seems to lack padding) – things that are easily fixable over time, however.
I think the drawbacks actually speak to the true MVP nature of this app – it’s clearly not the best version of the app product itself, but I do think how they’re approaching this problem is novel and still worth addressing, even in 2024. I’m glad Shine focused their energy on solving the core problem properly first, and over time they can invest in making the app experience even better.
Get Shine on the App Store and read Marissa Meyer’s thread on the launch.
From Zac Hall on 9to5Mac:
Unfortunately, Apple didn’t make a first-party USB-A to USB-C cable for this situation. Instead, the company sells a $29 USB-C to Lightning adapter as its official solution.
My advice? Don’t spend $30 on a dongle when you can just replace the cable. Even though Apple doesn’t sell one, USB-A to USB-C cables are easy to find.
Zach’s recommendations are great for more reliable brands, but I was looking for a super-short cable and landed on these “OneKer” cables that are only 1 foot long (and only just now noticed the pun in their name 🤣).
Today, alongside the announcement for WWDC’24, Apple revealed their Apple Developer channel on YouTube where they’re now publicly hosting developer videos, starting with everything released from WWDC’23.
Previously, videos were only available Apple’s own website or Developer apps, limiting the potential reach to folks who’d already heard of it – now YouTube users can freely discover and watch Apple developer videos to learn about building for their platforms.
As of writing, there are 40 videos uploaded – so it’s not the complete set from WWDC’23 (yet?) and as such I unfortunately can’t find any Shortcuts-related videos. Once more are uploaded, and folks tune in after WWDC’24, it’ll be super interesting to see view counts and comments on these videos – we’ll be able to see what’s more popular/interesting to folks, as well as check on common questions in the comments.
Plus, for the intrepid Shortcuts user, all of YouTube’s RSS or URL functionality is now available for Apple Developer videos – I’ll be able to scrape the title, thumbnail, and descriptions to make quick embeds on my website, for example 🤓.
From Tom Robertson at Coeffiencies:
Living in a house, or even an apartment or condo, as an adult, requires periodic maintenance tasks, like cleaning the bathroom, changing your sheets, replacing the furnace filter, etc. A lot of these tasks should ideally be done on a regular schedule, like changing your sheets every two weeks, or your furnace filter every 3 months for example.
I’m sure a lot of people just kind of mentally keep track of this kind of stuff, but I’ve never really trusted my own memory on it. And I don’t like the idea of a room being dirty serving as my reminder to clean it. I’d ideally like to clean it before it gets too dirty.
So to keep up-to-date on my household tasks, I need a way to help me with of the following:
- How many days has it been since I did that task?
- A reminder to do that task if it’s past the time it needs to be done.
Tom basically made the perfect solution I’ve been looking for using Reminders, Chronicling, and two custom shortcuts – well done.