Apple’s newest betas for iOS, iPadOS and macOS make a simple Shortcuts change that greatly improves the user experience across different devices.
Shortcuts now know which storage folders to use automatically — depending on your device — negating the need to manually update them individually for different hardware.
Shortcuts automatically adapt to your device
The Shortcuts app, which lets users create and share macros for automating tasks on their devices, finally came to Mac this fall after two years on iPhone and iPad. However, sharing your shortcuts across different Apple devices could be a bit of a pain until recently.
Prior to the latest betas, Shortcuts built for an iPhone or iPad needed to be manually updated to work on Mac because the devices use different default storage locations. But Apple’s most recent betas fix this, so Shortcuts adjusts storage locations automatically depending on device.
“As of the latest iOS/iPadOS/macOS betas, local storage paths in Shortcuts automatically translate across platforms,” tweeted Federico Viticci. “On My iPhone becomes On My iPad or the Documents folder on Mac, and vice versa.”
This saves users from updating storage locations themselves on different devices — for each individual Shortcut that needs storage access. Viticci calls it a “fantastic change for file automations.”
In beta for now
Again, this change only applies to Apple’s newest beta releases for now. So, don’t expect to see it in the public versions of iOS, iPadOS and macOS already available. You’ll need to keep updating your Shortcuts individually for the time being.
However, assuming the handy Shortcuts tweak doesn’t present any problems, this change should roll out in the next round of software updates.
