Shortcuts help & discussion

[gwhizkids]

Created a shortcut to create expense report entries (posted it in the Share Your Shortcuts thread). One of actions is to take a picture of a receipt and then use the "Save to Photo Album" action to save the receipt photo. I have designated an album I called Expenses to be the destination of the saved photo. My problem is that every time I close the shortcut, the target album resets to the main "Photos" album.

Any ideas? This may be a bug under Shortcuts 2.1 beta 1 and I may have to report it using Apple's Radar process.

EDIT: I was able to do a band-aid approach by creating a Text action with the word "~Expenses" in it and using a magic variable to have that inserted each run of the Shortcut into the Save to Photo Album input field. Not ideal though...

 

[Acronym]

It would seem that the YouTube downloader shortcuts no longer work? I have tried three different ones and all it is saving is a white photo. Anyone else experience this?

 

[Leggee]

It would seem that the YouTube downloader shortcuts no longer work? I have tried three different ones and all it is saving is a white photo. Anyone else experience this?

Same.

 

[gwhizkids]

It would seem that the YouTube downloader shortcuts no longer work? I have tried three different ones and all it is saving is a white photo. Anyone else experience this?

Same.

I’m not sure if all the iCloud issues have been resolved yet but that might be part of the issue.

 

[gwhizkids]

For those of you who dislike the announcement Shortcuts makes when running your Shortcuts, this is for you:

https://twitter.com/viticci/status/1055067745300201473?s=21

 

[gaanee]

Is it possible to create a Shortcut to resize an image to custom size. I found a resize image shortcut but it only takes one number and simply compresses it maintaining the aspect ration.
I am looking for something like - original image size 1920x1080, Specify new dimensions to resize: 640x1136.
This will change the aspect ratio and the resized image may look compressed or elongated.
So, is it possible to create a Shortcut to resize - specify your custom dimensions then crop part of the original image and apply resize only to that part or alternatively, crop part of the original image using the resize dimensions.

Wondering if this can be accomplished using Shortcut app or it's much more complicated and a full fledged app is required?

 

[gwhizkids]

Is it possible to create a Shortcut to resize an image to custom size. I found a resize image shortcut but it only takes one number and simply compresses it maintaining the aspect ration.
I am looking for something like - original image size 1920x1080, Specify new dimensions to resize: 640x1136.
This will change the aspect ratio and the resized image may look compressed or elongated.
So, is it possible to create a Shortcut to resize - specify your custom dimensions then crop part of the original image and apply resize only to that part or alternatively, crop part of the original image using the resize dimensions.

Wondering if this can be accomplished using Shortcut app or it's much more complicated and a full fledged app is required?

Yes. Go to the Shortcuts app and create a new shortcut. Search for the "Resize" action and add it to the Shortcut. It comes with a default width of 640 (and height of "Auto"), but you can insert your own values for these dimensions.

 

[Acronym]

I’m not sure if all the iCloud issues have been resolved yet but that might be part of the issue.

These iCloud issues would affect it even if I had downloaded the YouTube downloader shortcut when it first came out?

 

[Patriks7]

Don't know if it's been asked before, but I can't seem to find it anywhere - is there any way to change the ringer volume through a shortcut?

 

[gwhizkids]

Don't know if it's been asked before, but I can't seem to find it anywhere - is there any way to change the ringer volume through a shortcut?

I don’t know. Is it still happening? Can you post screenshots of your Shortcut?

 

[gwhizkids]

Don't know if it's been asked before, but I can't seem to find it anywhere - is there any way to change the ringer volume through a shortcut?

You can set the system volume generally, but not the ringer volume separately, as far as I can tell.

 

[gaanee]

How about for cropping part of the original image and then resize.. can it be done using Shortcuts?

Yes. Go to the Shortcuts app and create a new shortcut. Search for the "Resize" action and add it to the Shortcut. It comes with a default width of 640 (and height of "Auto"), but you can insert your own values for these dimensions.

 

[gwhizkids]

How about for cropping part of the original image and then resize.. can it be done using Shortcuts?

The answer is yes, but I did exactly what you could also do: open Shortcuts and typed "crop" into the search bar. Heppy to help, but self-help is the best way to learn the capabilities.

 

[Apple_Robert]

It would seem that the YouTube downloader shortcuts no longer work? I have tried three different ones and all it is saving is a white photo. Anyone else experience this?

Same for me.

 

[gwhizkids]

Same for me.

Can one of you post screenshots of this shortcut(s)? There are no native Shortcuts actions for YouTube that I see. How has it worked? Using x-callback actions? If so, perhaps the URL schemes for the YouTube videos has changed.

 

[Acronym]

Can one of you post screenshots of this shortcut(s)? There are no native Shortcuts actions for YouTube that I see. How has it worked? Using x-callback actions? If so, perhaps the URL schemes for the YouTube videos has changed.

I don’t know what happened exactly but the shortcut works fine now, so whatever the issue was it’s disappeared. I thought the same thing as you though, or that YouTube had made URL changes to prevent the shortcut from working.

 

[gwhizkids]

I don’t know what happened exactly but the shortcut works fine now, so whatever the issue was it’s disappeared. I thought the same thing as you though, or that YouTube had made URL changes to prevent the shortcut from working.

It may be that the API that the downloader calls has daily limits on the number of videos that can be downloaded. Or it was just broken for a few days.

 

[Leggee]

Can one of you post screenshots of this shortcut(s)? There are no native Shortcuts actions for YouTube that I see. How has it worked? Using x-callback actions? If so, perhaps the URL schemes for the YouTube videos has changed.

I originally found the YouTube downloader on the shortcuts gallery site but it's now been taken down. However there is still the Social Media downloader which does the same thing. I was having the same problem with just a white screen downloading then after updating to 12.1 I tried downloading a video from YouTube and it worked fine. I tried another video and back to the white screen. I deleted the video I successfully downloaded then tried downloading again and it was fine. I'm guessing it could be a copyright issue as the video that failed was a Vevo video. Also as a side note, the social media downloader seems to work better from the shortcuts app rather than the widget.

 

[gaanee]

This could be because iOS widgets have restrictions on how much memory it can use unlike the app. I am guessing if if the video you tried downloading is longer or HD and hits the memory limit so doesn't run properly.

Also as a side note, the social media downloader seems to work better from the shortcuts app rather than the widget.

 

[gwhizkids]

This could be because iOS widgets have restrictions on how much memory it can use unlike the app. I am guessing if if the video you tried downloading is longer or HD and hits the memory limit so doesn't run properly.

This is an area Apple should be a little more clear on. That is not obvious at all and most people expect the widget to simply be a proxy link and not have any memory limitations at all.

 

[adrianlondon]

I had to turn mine into proxy links by adding "Continue Shortcut in App" as the first step. It felt weird having the first item start with "Continue" but there we are.

For simple shortcuts it's best not to add that though, as it usually looks better to have the results show cleanly within the widget.

 

[adamgbiggs]

All my shortcuts are here for everyone to download.. https://routinehub.co/user/Adamgbiggs

Adam.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I have just created a Ulysses Journal shortcut with the location and date automatically added at the top of each new sheet. Is it possible to add a keyboard return to the shortcut, so that the keyboard cursor is double-spaced below the location and date, instead of single-spaced? If so, how do I add the command?

Group Name
Location
Date

 

[Zingo99]

So I had a shortcut to log my weight that was working OK, it uses the dictated text and adds a datapoint in the Healthapp. As I said it was working OK for a couple of weeks but now it only inputs whole numbers, no decimals, for ex 76,7 get a 76 datapoint. I THINK it changed with the 12.1 iOS update, anyone now what the problem could be?

 

[gwhizkids]

So I had a shortcut to log my weight that was working OK, it uses the dictated text and adds a datapoint in the Healthapp. As I said it was working OK for a couple of weeks but now it only inputs whole numbers, no decimals, for ex 76,7 get a 76 datapoint. I THINK it changed with the 12.1 iOS update, anyone now what the problem could be?

For stuff like this, it would be very helpful if you could post screenshots of your Shortcut. Otherwise, we’re just guessing.

Also, are you on Shortcuts 2.0 or 2.1?