Boosting Productivity with Three Essential Apple Shortcuts
Written on
Enhancing Efficiency with Apple Shortcuts
In the realm of productivity and automation, utilizing Apple Shortcuts can significantly streamline your tasks. Today, we'll explore three free text utility shortcuts that can elevate your productivity levels.
Previously, I relied on a tool called Text Case to format titles for my Medium articles. However, I recently unearthed an Apple Shortcut that can perform the same function. While Text Case is quite robust, I found that its singular feature was more than I needed, prompting me to seek a simpler and free solution via a shortcut. To my delight, I discovered that I could achieve this efficiently.
Curious about what other functions a shortcut could serve, I devised methods for sorting text and eliminating duplicate lines. As a result, I created three shortcuts available through the Share Menu.
These shortcuts can be accessed via the links below, allowing you to use them without needing to understand their underlying mechanics. For those interested in the technical side, I’ll guide you through the creation process, which typically involves just a couple of steps. All shortcuts operate similarly.
Each shortcut is accessible from the Share Menu across any compatible app. To use them, simply copy the desired text into your clipboard and select the relevant shortcut. If the shortcut name isn't visible, scroll down to tap "edit" and add it to your favorites.
After processing the text, the results will appear in a dialog box. You can then utilize the Share Menu within this dialog to copy the results back to your clipboard.
Enabling Third-Party Shortcuts
To use my version of a shortcut, you'll need to permit third-party shortcuts on your device. Follow the instructions provided in Apple's support documentation to enable this feature.
How to enable shared shortcuts on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch:
You can incorporate shortcuts from external sources, such as friends or websites. For more information, visit:
Once you've granted permission, you can leverage the links provided alongside each shortcut description. Upon clicking a shortcut link, your device will preview it and request approval for download. If you consent, the Apple Shortcuts app will save the shortcut to your device.
Change Case Shortcut
Here’s the link to the Change Case shortcut.
Here's a visual representation of this shortcut in action.
#### How It Functions
Creating this shortcut is straightforward. Simply add it to your Share Menu, ensuring it accepts any input. Upon launching, it will check the clipboard for text. To guarantee that I’m processing text, I include a Text action that takes the clipboard content as input.
Eliminate Duplicate Text
Here’s the link to the Remove Duplicates shortcut.
Here's a visual representation of this shortcut in action.
#### How It Works
To eliminate duplicate lines, I utilize a clever method with dictionaries. Shortcuts allow you to map values to unique keys, which are essential for this process. By treating each line of text as a key, I can effectively filter out duplicates. I format the text from the clipboard into a list, reassigning each entry as a key-value pair.
Sort Lines of Text
Here’s the link to the Sort Lines shortcut.
Here's a visual representation of this shortcut in action.
#### How It Works
This shortcut is a bit more intricate. First, it captures the text and converts it into a list using the Split action. Oddly, Shortcuts lacks a direct sort command for lists, but I found a workaround by treating the text as a collection of files. You can choose to sort the text either in ascending or descending order via a simple menu.
Conclusion
I take great pleasure in crafting simple shortcuts that serve practical purposes, especially when they involve overcoming a challenge. If you have any suggestions for additional shortcuts, feel free to share. I hope you find these tools beneficial!
For more insights, explore my additional articles on Apple Shortcuts: