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Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

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Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#21
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you share this? I have something similar for my own workflow but it's manual and involves a folder called "Everything".

Here's what ChatGPT spits out: https://chat.openai.com/share/89b37ac6-cbe1-4f07-b1dc-7736c5...

This reply seems very low effort and not helpful.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#22
sort of an automation, but I install all my favorite apps with brew and then use brew again (brew upgrade && brew upgrade --cask -g) to update everything

Bonus: I went the extra mile and wrote a script that bootstraps my entire setup: https://github.com/fastily/autobots/blob/master/macOS/setup/...

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#23
post #22

sort of an automation, but I install all my favorite apps with brew and then use brew again (brew upgrade && brew upgrade --cask -g) to update everything Bonus: I went the extra mile and wrote a script that bootstraps my entire setup: https://github.com/fastily/autobots/blob/master/macOS/setup/...

Friends here: https://github.com/ickc/bootstrapping-os-environments/tree/m...

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#24
post #9

Not an automation, technically, but maybe it could be: I have an AppleScript that is set to run every hour that grabs any files on my desktop that have been there longer than a day, and puts them in a dated folder in an archive folder. Same for my downloads.

I do this with my Downloads folder using Hazel[1]. I have an “Archive” folder split into subfolder of screenshots, pdfs, videos etc.. After a month in the downloads folder, Hazel moves everything into the Archive subfolder automatically, sorted by year and month.

[1]: https://www.noodlesoft.com/

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#25
I have a cron job taking a picture of my desktop four times per minute into a dated folder structure. It allows me to zoom back in time (days out weeks back) to figure out what I was doing at a particular time or if I was showing someone a particular bit of code or something like that.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#26
post #11
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you share this? I have something similar for my own workflow but it's manual and involves a folder called "Everything".

I'm also interested in this!

I wrote it up here a long time ago: https://gcanyon.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/keeping-a-clean-des...

I've made changes since then and I haven't documented them :-/ I'll try to find the time to write it up.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#27
post #10
post #9

Not an automation, technically, but maybe it could be: I have an AppleScript that is set to run every hour that grabs any files on my desktop that have been there longer than a day, and puts them in a dated folder in an archive folder. Same for my downloads.

Could you share this? I have something similar for my own workflow but it's manual and involves a folder called "Everything".

I wrote it up here a long time ago: https://gcanyon.wordpress.com/2013/05/12/keeping-a-clean-des...

I've made changes since then and I haven't documented them :-/ I'll try to find the time to write it up.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#28
post #24
post #9

Not an automation, technically, but maybe it could be: I have an AppleScript that is set to run every hour that grabs any files on my desktop that have been there longer than a day, and puts them in a dated folder in an archive folder. Same for my downloads.

I do this with my Downloads folder using Hazel[1]. I have an “Archive” folder split into subfolder of screenshots, pdfs, videos etc.. After a month in the downloads folder, Hazel moves everything into the Archive subfolder automatically, sorted by year and month. [1]: https://www.noodlesoft.com/

Yep, I've been recommended Hazel before, but I like the control I get with the AppleScript. In particular I like the higher cadence of sweeps, mine does my desktop, downloads, and documents folders, and mine will ignore a file if it has a label, so I can easily keep things if I want.

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#29

Podcasts in the shower: on bluetooth speaker connect, add 15 mins to the current time, set focus mode that ignores everyone until 15 mins later, resume podcasts playlist wherever it was left off. Only annoyance with this shortcut is it’ll pop up a notification to approve running the shortcut when it detects the speaker has been turned on. I have those cheap paper nfc stickers hidden in random spots around the house a…

What app are you using for shared shopping list?

Re: Ask HN: What are your favorite iOS/macOS automations?

#30
post #17

I'm a deep sleeper and need several alarms to wake up. I have an automation which sets several at various increments, enables the sleep focus mode on my phone and sets the Home Assistant alarm script at that time too.

How’d you do this? I’ve got an alarm entry at every 10th minute of every hour from manually doing this over the years
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