Secondly, App Shortcuts are now supported on HomePod.
This requires an App Shortcut enabled app to be installed on a companion iOS or iPadOS device. Unlike running on iOS or iPadOS, where App Shortcuts can result in launching the app, on HomePod, App Shortcuts may not launch the app at all.
For example, by simply having my Demo app on my iPhone, I can say to my HomePod, “Hey, Siri. Summarize my groceries list with Demo.” HomePod support for App Shortcuts is available from version 16.2 and newer.
When designing App Shortcuts for HomePod, consider that it is a voice-only device. Make sure you are returning clear and concise dialog to be spoken by Siri, since there won’t be any corresponding visuals.
The IntentDialog class has an initializer that takes both a “full” and “supporting” string. The HomePod will use the “full” dialog, while visual devices like iPhone will use the alternate “supporting” dialog. This allows you to be more brief when a user can reference a visual output, but remain fully descriptive if no screen is available.
I’m glad Apple (and developers) are putting in the work to match the dialog to the device – and that HomePod is getting even better Shortcuts support this year.
I’m pretty sure it’s new that watchOS-only apps can now enable shortcuts to the shortcuts app without having an iOS companion app 😍✨
I can indeed confirm this is new – Apple mentions it in their “Spotlight your app with App Shortcuts” developer session from WWDC’23. Here’s what they say in the video:
App Shortcuts now work on Apple Watch, but you should be aware of some limitations to get the best possible experience. App Shortcuts on Apple Watch must come from a watchOS app installed on the device itself. App Shortcuts from a paired iOS device cannot be run on the Watch. This means that if you have an iOS app installed on iPhone, but not the corresponding watchOS app, your App Shortcuts will not work from watchOS.
Flexible matching with Siri is not available on Apple Watch, so phrases must be spoken exactly. Apple Watch support was introduced in watchOS 9.2 and is available on all devices running that version or later.
App Shortcuts are also now discoverable on Apple Watch. Just like on iOS, the Shortcuts app on watchOS prominently features App Shortcuts available on the device.
Just to be clear, App Shortcuts will work on both standalone watchOS apps and companion watchOS apps.
Plus, you will run into issues if you’re trying to run App Shortcuts from the watch and the corresponding iPhone app doesn’t have a Watch app – developers, get to building your watch apps!
Folder Actions is pretty clever—you can run scripts when items are added or removed from a folder, when the folder is opened or closed, or when the window of that folder is moved in Finder.
Unfortunately, this is a feature that is wired directly into AppleScript. So in order to use a version of my existing shortcut with Folder Actions, I needed to write a three-line AppleScript script:
on adding folder items to this_folder after receiving added_items
tell application "Shortcuts Events" to run the shortcut named "Apple Result Transcriptor" with input added_items
end adding folder items to
Pretty dumb — for those keeping score we’ve now gone from Audio Hijack to AppleScript to Shortcuts in order to get what we want. (I could’ve rewritten my Shortcut in AppleScript, but… I don’t want to do that!) And yet also pretty brilliant, because I’m using a 21-year-old OS feature to run a Shortcut, an automation system that didn’t appear on the Mac until 2021.
Neat feature – and I agree with Jason’s conclusions at the end about Automations on the Mac.
Just noticed something neat in macOS Sonoma: as you know, #Safari now shows favicons in your bookmarks bar. But if you rename a bookmark and add an emoji, that emoji acts as a custom favicon ✨
Neat – I just updated my whole group of Favorites folders in Bookmarks.
Something to note though – the emoji works best at the end. Either way you place it, Safari appears to inherit the space as well – if you prepend it, the space goes before the emoji and just creates more space for the whole bookmark[1]; if you append it, however, the space shows before your bookmark title and it doesn’t look great.
I’m super glad to have access on the betas to SoundSource for manual control over volume from my audio interface, and Loopback for combining audio feeds while streaming – and I’ve been meaning to use Audio Hijack for my member podcast as well.
All you need to do is use Edit > Save Theme, then use the Create Presentation action and scroll to the bottom of the Templates list to the My Themes area!
Open Keynote: Opens the Keynote desktop app on Mac and the mobile app from iPhone/iPad.
Open my presentation: Opens a pre-selected Keynote presentation. I use this with any current presentation that I may be working on.
Open password-protected presentation: Asks you to enter the password for a locked presentation, then passes it to the file as it opens it in Keynote.
Open from Keynote docs: Gets the contents of the Keynote folder in iCloud, asks you to pick from a presentation, and opens it in Keynote.
Start presentation: Asks you to pick from your Keynote folder in iCloud Drive and opens the presentation in Show Mode.
Rehearse presentation: Presents your presentations in Keynote, asks you to pick one, and opens it in Rehearsal Mode.
Create custom presentation: Creates a presentation from your “My Themes” section, which appears when you use Edit > Save Theme in Keynote.
Create Basic presentation: Presents a menu of Basic themes from Keynote to create – choose from Basic White, Basic Black, Classic White, White, and Black.
Create Dynamic presentation: Pick from Apple’s cool movement-based Dynamic presentations in Keynote – including Light, Dark, and Rainbow options.
Create Minimal presentation: Asks you to choose between Miniminal themes in Keynote – pick from Basic Color, Color Gradient Light, Color Gradient, Gradient, Showroom, Modern Portfolio, Slate, and Photo Essay.
Create Bold presentation: Presents a list of Bold presentation themes available in Keynote – choose from Bold Color, Showcase, Briefing, Academy, Modern Type, and Exhibit
Create Editorial themes: Presents a menu of Editorial themes in Keynote – pick from Feature Story, Look Book, Classic, Editorial, and Cream Paper.
Create Portfolio presentation: Presents a menu of Portfolio-style presentations to create in Keynote – choose from Industrial, Blueprint, Graph Paper, Chalkboard, Photo Portfolio, and Leather Book.
Create Craft presentation: Pick from Craft presentation themes in Keynote – options are Artisan, Improv, Drafting, Kyoto, Brushed Canvas, or Craft styles.
Create Textured presentation: Asks you to pick from various Keynote themes in the Textured category – choose between Parchment, Renaissance, Moroccan, Hard Cover, Linen Book, Vintage, Typeset, Harmony, and Formal.
Play my radio station: Plays the personalized radio station curated for you by Apple Music.
Play Discovery station: Plays Apple Music’s newest “Discovery” station that plays curated tracks from outside your library or playlists.
Play Apple Music 1: Plays the main curated radio station for Apple Music, previously known as Beats 1.
Play Apple Music Hits: Opens the Apple Music Hits radio station that plays top tracks from the service (as opposed to the main Apple Music 1 channel).
Open Mood playlists: Opens the curated pages of playlists for various Moods included in Apple Music.
Open Genre pages: Opens deep link into the genre pages in Apple Music.
Open Apple Music artists: Presents a list of Apple Music 1 radio shows and opens the corresponding URL to their curator page.
Open Apple Music TV: Opens the deep link into Apple Music TV, immediately starting the currently-playing music videos.
Open Apple Music Essentials: Opens the Apple Music curator page for Essentials playlists of the top tracks from popular artists – great for playing across an artist’s discography instead of picking an album.
Play my Favorites mix: Plays the automatic Favorites Mix curated by Apple Music for you, updated Mondays.
Play my Get Up mix: Kick off some energetic tracks from your Get Up Mix in Apple Music, with new tracks added every Tuesday.
Play my Friends mix: Starts the “Friends Mix” playlist from Apple Music’s Made For You feature – playlist is updated every Friday.
Play my New Music mix: Plays tracks from the New Music Mix updated every Friday in Apple Music.
Play my Chill Mix: Plays the Chill Mix that’s “Made For You” by Apple Music. Updated every Sunday, this one is good for unwinding in the evening or relaxing on the weekends.
Open EDC live sets: Opens the editor page in Apple Music for EDC’s series of live sets from over the years.
Open Soulection Radio: Opens the editor page in Apple Music for Soulection radio, a laid-back show that airs on Sunday nights.
Open the Boiler Room: Opens the editor page in Apple Music for the Boiler Room, a series of shows for underground dance music with a webcam showing the set.
Explore Apple Music hosts: Presents a playlist of Apple Music host pages and opens the deep link into that section of the Music app.
Craig Hockenberry of Iconfactory speaking on The Talk Show #382, starting at 1:13:23 (transcribed and lightly edited for text):
I see a lot of opportunities there for developers to make the widgets just come alive. I think it’s a great little thing that they’ve done.
The side effect of this, I think is—even kind of probably better in the long term—is that that way you do this is something that’s sort of like a little shortcut. And it’s gonna expose a lot of developers to the Shortcuts technology.
So like that button that’s on your widget that says, oh, play this radio station? Well, I’m obviously gonna write a shortcut that says, play this radio station. So you can automate that. So, like, if I go into my Focus mode, or if I get home, it starts playing the radio station on the kitchen HomePod.
And for me that’s the thing that really is powerful because it takes that interaction and makes it something that you can use throughout your life. That’s for me the most interesting thing, that’s why we’re talking about vision OS and all these other things is interactions that fit into your life, are really – that’s the goal.
New in the fourth developer beta and second public beta of iOS 17, Apple has added an “Open Camera” action for the Camera app that allows users to pick between camera modes and immediately open to any preset using Shortcuts.
The new “Open Camera” action can be set to switch between the following modes:
Photo
Selfie
Video
Portrait
Portrait Selfie
Cinematic
Slo-Mo
Time-Lapse
Pano
I’ve built a folder of shortcuts for each action, available now as part of my membership program in pre-release ahead of iOS 17.
These actions are highly welcome to the set of Media actions available by default in Shortcuts, as well as my collection of photography shortcuts built off of them.
In the betas for iOS and iPadOS 17, Apple has updated the Automations feature in Shortcuts so that triggers can “Run Immediately” rather than the default “Run After Confirmation.”
In effect, Automations are, well, actually automatic now, rather than triggers that require manual confirmation – here’s the breakdown:
Updated Automations
In Shortcuts, all Automation types—except Arrive, Leave, and Before I Commute in the current betas—now have a new “Run Immediately” option.
Update: As of iOS developer beta 5, Location automations also run immediately!
That means automations from Messages, Email, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth now join the rest of the Automation triggers as true automations, alongside the new Transaction automation for Apple Wallet and the Display automation & Stage Manager automations on iPadOS.
For the Wi-Fi automation trigger, there’s also an additional dialog that lets you toggle whether to Run After Connection Interruption, with the following explainer text beneath:
If you reconnect to a Wi-Fi network within 3 minutes of being disconnected, this automation will not run again.
Subtle changes to Automations
To ensure user safety, Apple also requires that these automation types always notify you—the “Notify When Run” toggle does not appear if you switch to “Run Immediately”—so that you know for sure when something has happened on your device. Personally, I think this is a worthy trade-off – otherwise, how would you ever know that the Automation triggered successfully?
Further, the confusingly-named “Don’t Ask Before Running?” prompt has been renamed across all Automations to “Run After Confirmation,” making it much clearer what’s actually happening with each option.
Finally, you might also notice that Apple removed a step when initially creating an automation. Previously, you’d always have to pick between Personal Automations and Home Automations.
Now, the Add button starts you off in a Personal Automation by default—with a new Search field at the top as well.
Home Automations are simply found at the bottom of the list as an alternate option (you can still create Automations in the Home app as always).
Location automations
It’s not clear currently if the Location automations for Arrive, Leave, and Before I Commute will be exempt from true automation capabilities in the the final release of iOS and iPadOS 17.
That’s because, in the first developer beta, the Location automations were truly automatic – but, crucially, that option was removed and has not been available in any subsequent betas.
Hopefully we see the return of this capability in future betas, and Shortcuts can fully shed the misnomer status this feature has earned from being named “Automations” without having all of the triggers be truly automatic – otherwise, I’ll have to rename this piece.
True automation starts now
Automations actually being automatic will be a big deal for Shortcuts users in iOS 17 – in many ways, the feature has been hamstrung for its entire existence, because many users try it out, then get disappointed when it’s not truly automation.
Going forward, Automations will be a pillar for new users and pro users alike to get a lot of value from building in Shortcuts – all without even doing anything themselves, since everything happens automatically.
In the iOS and iPadOS 17 betas, Apple has introduced three new Automation triggers you can use in the Shortcuts app – Transaction, Display, and Stage Manager.
Here’s how Apple’s tip text describes each:
Transaction (Ex. When I tap a Wallet Card or Pass)
Display (Ex. When My Display Connects)
Stage Manager (Ex. When Stage Manager Is Turned On)
Transaction automations
Transactions work with Payment, Transit, Access, or Identity passes, plus you can select which card, which category of payment, or even specific Merchants.
The automation starts with an optional “Receive Transaction As Input”, allowing you to extract details about the transaction, including the card or pass, merchant, and amount – this is an incredibly powerful trigger when combined with things like expense tracking, budgeting, or travel apps.
Display automations
The Display automation works with the iPad Pro’s external display support, allowing actions to be kicked off when you plug in or disconnect a monitor cable.
The automation starts with an optional “Receive Display As Input” that allows you to extract the manufacturing Name of the device and adjust your flow accordingly — I have both Dell and LG monitors in separate rooms in my house, so I could use an If action to change my shortcut behavior depending on which room I’m in.
Stage Manager automations
Finally, the Stage Manager automation works with the system feature being toggled on or off, either from Settings, the Control Center widget, or the Shortcuts actions themselves that can Toggle Stage Manager in any shortcut.
I haven’t personally implemented this automation for my own setup yet, but I’m consider simply using Open App multiple times to “set the stage” each time I activate it with my most common apps – but I’ll have to test more during the beta season.
Automate away
Overall, these three new automations are highly welcome. The Transaction automation will surely get the most use and can apply to almost every iPhone user, and the iPad automations for Displays and Stage Manager are great additions for iPad productivity – there’s much value to be captured with all three of these.
Plus, each automation can Run Immediately (instead of requiring you to Run After Confirmation), meaning they’re true background automations – very nice.
I also think the presence of Display and Stage Manager are either a hint or justification for Automations in Shortcuts for Mac – I hope Mac users get the opportunity to automate their devices with these triggers in the future.
From Kurt Knutsson of the CyberGuy Report over on Yahoo:
With the power of technology at our fingertips, it’s becoming easier to manage daily life, even for those grappling with issues such as short-term memory loss. Apple’s “Remember This” shortcut is one such tool that acts as an invaluable assistant for memory support and mindfulness.
This shortcut lets you quickly build a visual and textual log of your daily activities and serves as a handy digital journal.
Here’s a step-by-step guide on setting it up and using it effectively.
I missed sharing about this shortcut when it was originally released by Apple back in May – worth checking out for sure.
Since the last issue in mid-July, news has been a bit quiet on the Shortcuts front thanks to a delayed second public beta – developer beta 3 was a bit rough, and now beta 4 is out today along with the public beta late in the he day.
As such, I held off on a few stories related to beta features that I have yet to cover, so my Automations and Widget coverage are coming tomorrow morning instead.
However, I did discover a new action in the betas, plus uploaded my new Threads scraping tool to the Library too – shortcuts are live now, and stories on those are coming later this week as well.
Otherwise, I published a couple of holdover posts on Threads, a few interesting tips related to power user features you might use if you’re a Shortcuts fan, and a series of linked posts to check out.
Are you worried about leaving your iPhone to charge for extended periods and what it can do to your battery life? While your device notifies you when the battery percentage drops below 20% and 10%, there’s no other way to know when it’s fully charged without manually checking.
But having to constantly check if your iPhone is fully charged can be an inconvenience. The good news is, with the built-in Shortcuts app, you can set up a custom alert that triggers when your iPhone reaches full charge. We’ll show you how to do it:
A lot of shortcuts come in pairs. I have one shortcut that sets my phone to light mode and bumps up the text size for taking screenshots; a corresponding one sets my phone back to dark mode and lowers the text size again. On my Mac, I have a shortcut that turns on my Podcasting focus, launches Logic, Chrome and Skype, and hides everything else; a matching one turns off the focus and opens all my other apps back up.
It’s natural that you might want to put two matching shortcuts in one small widget. Now, in iOS 17, that’s possible:
According to the code found in iOS 17 beta 4, the Action button could have nine different options that users can customize and assign to different actions. While the code only lists feature names related to the Action button, we can infer what most of them will be able to do:
[…]
Shortcuts: As on the Apple Watch Ultra, this option would let users run any shortcut they have created or downloaded from the Shortcuts app, such as sending a message, playing a playlist, or controlling smart home devices.
If the Action button is coming from Apple Watch Ultra, it will surely support Shortcuts – the question is, do we only get one shortcut for the button at all times? Apple definitely needs a more advanced interface for picking which shortcut works on the Action button – I suggest Focus modes.
