Dynamically generating menus for Action Button or Shortcut in Dock

Shortcuts
1

Listening to episode 139, which was great, and inspired me to share this. Maybe this is so 2021 to everyone else, but it’s recently made my life easier:

While I don’t have an action button, I have a shortcut in my doc that is similar. It will present a different menu, based on variables like wifi and time.

But, I have some of the same shortcut actions showing up in multiple menus, and changing/adding/moving and organizing was hard to keep track across multiple menus, so I wanted to simplify things.

My master shortcut generates a number from 1-6, based on time and location. Then it pulls a list from data jar (which is currently):

234: Things: Phone
12: Order Venti at Mission
2: Order Venti at Hayvenhurst
134: Aqara Home _
6: WiFi Off
25: Take This Down
23456: In Person Focus Prep
25: iOS Zoom Menu
25: Bathroom Code Menu
25: COFFEE
345: Calzy _
5: Swift Scan _
123: Weight (New)
13: See Weight History
12: Pete Morning
34: BT On
34: BT Off
123456: ***CANCEL***
25: Vaccine Card
4: LinkedIn Recruiter
5: Get Home Reminders
1234: See Morning Reminders

The shortcut filters this list by that number, deletes all text before the first letter, and builds a list to choose from.

After I chose an item from list, if the chosen item ends with “_ ,” it removes it and passes that name to an “Open App” action. If not, it passes the name to a “Run Shortcut” action.

I keep this list as a text file in IA writer, so I can add, move and change which items show up, all from one text file. i have another shortcut that simply reuploads the text from this text file to DataJar.

Hope this inspires or helps someone else!

3 Likes
2

Using the underscore to open apps is a fantastic idea! I currently have an open app shortcut, but your method seems simpler than mine. Your approach to organizing your list through multiple menus has been incredibly helpful for me.

3

I prefer to use Arc on mac, but use safari on iphone/ipad. Your approach inspired a change in my automations too, for keeping a centralized list of my most frequently used websites for work. I now keep a dictionary in Data Jar. The keys match tab names in Arc, and the values have the URLs. On the idevices, i use Shortcuts to pull the dictionary from Data Jar, present a list of choices, and open the selected URL. On Mac, I most commonly launch automations and scripts via scripkit.app (similar to Alfred/Raycast). So a script there pulls the tab names from Data Jar (by getting the output of a Shortcut that returns that), lets me choose from that list of tab names, and opens the selection using some applescript to open it in my “Work” workspace in Arc.

1 Like
4

that is really great to hear. glad to finally have helped someone else on these forums, given how much help I have received, haha!

5

I’d be interested in seeing your actual shortcut if that’s something you could share. Even though I have an action button, I like the approach and would like to learn more. Thanks!

6

Happy to. I don’t know if it’s “commented” enough to make any sense, but in case it helps, here’s the link:

Menu From Data Jar Shortcut

1 Like
7

Thanks so much! I have downloaded it and will examine it soon!