Welcome to Issue 9 of “What’s New in Shortcuts?”
Hello all – hope you had an excellent weekend too! ?
I’ve got lots of fun Shortcuts goodness coming soon, so until then let’s jump right in:
DAYLIGHT SHORTCUTS TIME
Nothing fully makes you feel the season like a time jump – this November is full of change and feels like an important time to look forward. Here’s how I’m doing that just a little bit better with Shortcuts:
- “Hey Siri, how much daylight is left?”
With Daylight Saving Time messing with sunrise and sunset times alongside the changing of the seasons, it’s hard to know when to expect to have daylight – using this shortcut regulary has been helping me adjust to the shift. - “Hey Siri, open Twitter lists.”
I don’t know about you, but I’ve refreshed Twitter more times that I care to remember this week – but I make sure to check in on my actual Lists with this shortcut and check in on what specific groups of people are saying at any given time. This week I’m making this Members-Only shortcut free so you can curate your Lists and continue paying attention to things that are important to you. - “Hey Siri, Office podcasts.”
Earlier this summer I switched to the Podcasts app to take full advantage of the AirPlay 2 capabilities on HomePod as well as the Listen Now and Up Next features – once the HomePod Mini I ordered gets here, it’ll be taking this one’s place in my office and I’ll continue using this shortcut to hand off my current podcast to the office speaker so I can listen out loud.
SHORTCUTS POWER TOOLS
Many people will find areas where the native Shortcuts actions or the shortcuts from your apps don’t go far enough in their capabilities – here’s a set of three Shortcuts-adjacent apps to get to expand what you can do on iOS:
- Toolbox Pro
From developer Alex Hay, this is a must-have app for anyone using Shortcuts – it’s in the name, but it gives you over 100 new tools in your kit for making both basic and advanced shortcuts. - Shortcutify
This is my personal favorite Shortcuts-based app because it solves very specific needs for me, Airtable in particular – Shortcutify‘s actions are part of what make this newsletter possible, but there’s also support for Google Drive and Spotify. - MFC Deck
Shortcuts pro & developer Adam Tow has released a new app that combines the capabilities of a Shortcuts launcher with a StreamDeck-like approach – you can set up profiles, switch contexts, and even repurpose one NFC tag for multiple purposes by linking the Automations to MFC Deck actions in Shortcuts.
THE ENDLESS WEEK IS OVER
In between bouts of endless refreshing, I did put on a stream to distract myself Tuesday morning, watched many YouTube videos on pre-production throughout the week, and spent time talking with friends & family – here’s a handful of shortcuts I found a need for throughout all that:
- “Hey Siri, prepend to note.”
If you caught Tuesday’s livestream, I hope it helped you stay distracted while awaiting the news – while I was live I answered someone’s question about how to prepend to something in Notes. While it isn’t 100% possible, I came up with this method that creates a duplicate with your appended text on time – get the shortcut and watch the segment if you’re curious how I did it. - “Hey Siri, open YouTube history.”
After Election Day, I watched lots of YouTube on my Xbox now that I have a new monitor, plus on my Nest Hub and iPhone – but usually, I found myself trying to save the video link later on and kept having to dive into my History multiple times this week – this saves me the multiple taps it takes to get there each time. - “Hey Siri, help me think through this.”
Sometimes this hardest part about honing ideas is just being able get what’s in your head out of there and captured somewhere else – I don’t always feel like writing it down or have someone to talk it through with, so I like to use Just Press Record to make voice memos (which can also be transcribed later if I want to copy anything I said).
CATALOG UPDATES
I’m working towards a Thanksgiving release for the Shortcuts Catalog, including some previously-bonus information becoming freely available, a new module of content for the site, and a whole set of work shortcuts for members only.
Plus, I’ll be doing occasional community events, hosting exclusive working sessions for members, and sharing expanded guides for specific topics I cover or areas of my work – I can’t wait!
Here’s more from this week:
- Members Only page is optimized again.
I’m adopting a new application that I’m absolutely in love with for my Members content (more on Thursday) that enables easier updates while not affecting the WordPress backend – members can find a few of the bonus content pages hosted there and linked out now instead of inline. Check them out and let me know what you think! - New #chatroom in the Shortcuts User Group
Folks who’ve joined the Shortcuts User Group are now free to hang out and chat in the new thread-less channel in the Slack. Members can get access here ahead of an upcoming public announcement for the community. - Follow CassinelliMedia for individual links
I’ve had this in my Twitter bio for a while, but I have a secondary Twitter account that tweets out links to this newsletter – I’ll be adding in new shortcuts, livestream announcements, and more in the coming weeks, so follow the account now and you’ll start to see them come in.
Have a great week!
