Latest Shortcuts for macOS Has Vast Improvements
What's new in Shortcuts in iOS 15.4 and macOS 12.3:
“End If” and “End Repeat” can now be dragged in the Shortcuts editor
That’s a big deal. I’ve abandoned attempts at refactoring shortcuts solely because I couldn’t move entire blocks of If statements.
“Combine Images” no longer produces empty images on macOS
I ran into this bug right away and couldn’t believe it.
The "Shortcuts Events" app, which provides scripting functionality for Shortcuts on macOS, no longer needs to be opened manually before it can be used from scripts
This is potentially a big deal? I don’t know enough about how Shortcuts works but I’ve run into many problems running Shortcuts via apps like Hazel, and I bet some of them were because of the above issue they resolved.
This is a great update.
Here goes my second brew - a simple Bavarian Hefeweizen. With way warmer than normal temperatures I figure our house will be close to or within the ideal fermentation temperature range. 🤞
Eurasian Collared Dove drinking party.
Potatoe croquettes for lunch today. Great use of leftover mashed potatoes.
Citrus gummies are a great way to use backyard citrus. We made Meyer lemon with Valencia orange gummies. An Alton Brown recipe. We’ve frozen our remaining Meyer lemon juice. Our citrus season is now over.
macOS Shortcuts, Logger for Shortcuts, Shortcuts Temporary Files, and Hazel
Logger for Shortcuts provided me exactly the information to figure out how to get Hazel to properly use a Shortcut against a file. Now I can have Hazel run a specific Shortcut against a file whenever a new file shows up.
Background: for some reason when Hazel starts a Shortcut, the Shortcut operates on a copy of the file in a temporary folder. My programmer brain assumed that the Shortcut Input would be immutable. Nope. Turns out Shortcut Input is a temporary file that all Shortcut operations (like exiftool) must then run against. So while you think you’ve been working on a specific file in a specific folder, Shortcuts has been working on a copy of it all along in a temporary folder. Thus you must output the Shortcut Input to provide the file you’ve been modifying (in this case with exiftool). It’s very frustrating for Shortcuts to override paths with its own temporary paths but thanks to Logger for Shortcuts I quickly figured out this vexing issue. Already the app is worth $9.99 because now I’ve got the time saving Hazel ruleset I always wanted.
Here’s the Hazel embedded Apple Script I have to run to make a Shortcut with a file output (Shortcut Input (gah)) to work. I suppose now that I’ve fixed the Shortcuts issue this could now be more simply done… but it works (I’ve never had any success with running Hazel’s built in Shortcuts capability and right now it can’t even list the available Shortcuts):
do shell script “shortcuts run ’Shortcut Name Modified for use with Hazel’ -i ” & quoted form of POSIX path of theFile & “ -o ” & quoted form of POSIX path of theFile
Logger for Shortcuts output clearly showing me the ridiculous temporary folder Shortcuts is using to work on Shortcut Input:
From last Monday near Tomales Point in beautiful California, a genus Arctia moth caterpillar on lupins.
Raspberry Shakes do great science in the challenging conditions of Haiti: When a seismic network failed, citizen science stepped in on Ars Technica
I’ve been playing Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 on the Xbox Series S. I’m surprised at how it keeps my mind off everything and on a passion of mine and so it really helps my anxiety. Last time I played was w/ FS 98. This is amazing but not without some bizarre issues.
From last Monday, a very loud acorn woodpecker at the Point Reyes National seashore visitor center.
From last Monday, the Pacific Ocean and Tonalite rock at Tomales Point.
Peppers and two tomato seedlings are making great progress. We’ll likely be hardening them off in a few weeks and plant by April.🌱
More Point Reyes National Seashore photos from last Monday: bumble hovering near a flower, elk, and another coyote.
Yesterday, at Point Reyes National Seashore on the Tomales Point Trail, this hunting coyote could have been showing off. The coyote didn’t catch anything.
The freeze we got a few weeks ago, down to 28°F, did no clear harm to our plants. Mandarin, Valencia, Meyer lemon, & avocado flowers fine. Our nectarine is setting fruit as shown by this cute little green ovary. And ladybugs are all over our California wild roses 🌱🌳
Front yard is looking really nice. I’ve been trying to rein it in with lots of pruning. I know our annual wildflowers super appreciated the 0.38” of rain last week. 🌱
After weeks of warmer than normal weather, weather swung the other way and we had freezing temps for a few days. Had to cover up the weaker & less freeze tolerant trees. I don’t see damage to my earlier than normal blooming trees yet: all citrus, all stone fruit, one avocado 🌱🤞
We’re slowly preparing the backyard crop rows for planting. We just pulled all the weeds & bolting cilantro out to the compost pile. Saturday we enjoyed a fresh fennel salad. Next weekend we’ll test the drip tape, make any repairs, remove cat poop 🙄, and then add compost. 🌱
Harvested our first homegrown Valencia orange this year. So very sweet. Even the pith isn’t bitter. We may want to harvest the rest early if there’s a freeze later this week. Fortunately there’s only a dozen-ish. ~243 mandarins harvested so far — makes great juice 🌱🌳
The Annie Cat.
