The 6 Best Automation Apps for iOS

UPDATE: I address my favorite automations and advanced workflows in a recent episode of my podcast. Listen and subscribe below…

Listen on Apple Podcasts Listen on Spotify RSS Feed

Interested in learning some apps this summer that will make your school year easier in the fall? Here are my favorite automation apps for iOS and a very brief explanation of each. Don’t worry, I am planning on blogging about a few of these at length later this year.

Note: All of these apps take a little bit of an investment to learn but the payoff is HUGE. You will find yourself doing things on your iPhone and iPad you never thought were possible. If customizing your own automations seems daunting, every one of these apps has a user-submitted gallery where you can download actions that other people have already made.

1. Workflow

Download here

Workflow is an automation tool that allows you to string together various different actions so that they can be initiated with a single tap. The list of actions you can choose from is dense and many of them are easy to understand without any coding experience. You could do something as simple as open the camera, take three pictures, and generate a .gif file all in one tap (see below). This idea is novel of course. The real power is in figuring out how to take tedious actions that require multiple taps and apps and string them all up into one tap using Workflow’s rich list of integrated apps. One of my favorite Workflows looks into my Dropbox folder for a PDF of a seating chart, generates a copy, and opens it in Notability on my iPad, where I can scribble information about my student’s progress with an Apple Pencil. (See this workflow depicted below).

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Apple just purchased Workflow earlier this year. My hope is that this will allow users to better automate Apple’s own apps and even system level actions down the road.

2. Drafts

Download here

Drafts is a clean and minimalist text editor that allows you to send text to other apps. Think of it as the starting point for all text on you iPhone or iPad. It functions like a simple, text based, note taking app, until you swipe left and reveal a series of actions you can perform on the text. You can perform actions as simple as posting your text as a Facebook status, Tweet, text message, or email. You can also create actions so complex that they can include JavaScript. One of my more basic Drafts actions takes a list of items I have typed in a rush and imports them all into my Grocery list, which is a list I keep in the Apple Reminders app.

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3. IFTTT

Download here

IFTTT (If This Then That) is a web service that allows you to create If-Then statements that trigger actions to happen in apps. First, the user logs into all of their connected services (Facebook, Twitter, WordPress, Philips Hue Lights, Gmail, etc…). Then the user creates “Applets” where something that is done in one service can trigger something to happen in another service. For example, I could say “IF I am tagged in a Facebook post, THEN save that photo to my Dropbox. Or “IF I favorite that YouTube video, THEN save it to my Evernote notebook and tag it videos.” Of course, you can get really crazy with home automation apps and do things like “IF someone mentions me on Twitter, THEN flicker my Philips Hue light bulbs red.”

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4. Editorial

Download here

Editorial is a text editor meant primarily for longer form writing. If you have a blog and an iPad, this app really shines. The app supports plain text, Markdown, and TaskPaper. Markdown is a syntax that allows users to create formatting like headings, bullet lists, tables, and expressions for the web without actually using HTML. For example, when I wrote this blog post, I did not click around in the toolbar to make each of the sections of this post into headings. Instead I just typed ‘##’ in front of each of them, and my blogging service of choice, Squarespace (which interprets Markdown), automatically did the formatting for me. See below for an example.

TaskPaper is an amazing app for Mac that allows you to create checkable todo lists using only plain text. The syntax that the app uses also goes by the same name – TaskPaper. It is a really friendly way to work with checklists without taking your finger off the keyboard to format things. See the example below to get an idea what TaskPaper does. TaskPaper doesn’t have an iOS app, so the fact that Editorial works with TaskPaper files is great!

Much like Drafts, Editorial also has powerful user customizable workflows that you can perform on your text. You could have it post to your WordPress blog in one tap, for example. My favorite Editorial Workflow takes a list I wrote in the TaskPaper format and uses it as a template for reoccurring projects in my task app of choice, OmniFocus. Certain projects that I perform over and over again contain similar tasks. For example, I always do the same fifteen to twenty things every time I put on a band concert at my school. I keep a checklists of these tasks stored in Editorial so that every time I have a concert, take a sub day, or go on a field trip, I tap one button in Editorial and it imports the list into OmniFocus, complete with due dates, flags, and tags.

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5. Launch Center Pro

Download here

Launch Center Pro is kind of like a springboard (the screen of apps you see when you unlock your iPhone) only it launches actions instead of apps. Actions can do almost anything. In fact, all of the apps in this post can be launched from within Launch Center. For example, I can publish my Workflows as buttons in Launch Center. I can create buttons in Launch Center that trigger IFTTT Applets. Launch Center actions can also launch apps, turn lights on and off in my house, take me into specific lists within my todo app, and more!

Launch Center Pro took me a little more time to get my head around because it assumes that the user knows a little bit about something called x-callback-url. This is a protocol that most of the apps in this post take advantage of but don’t quite expose to the user. With Launch Center Pro, I felt like I really had to learn this system before digging in. Fortunately, MacStories has a great tutorial that you can read here.

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6. Launcher

Download here

Launcher is a much simpler and friendlier version of Launch Center Pro. Setting up actions is very straightforward and a number of them are available as pre-built templates. Launcher lives entirely inside of a Today Widget, which is a special widget that you can invoke on iOS by dragging down from the top of the screen or by swiping to the right of your first screen of apps. Launch Center Pro also has a widget available that does much the same thing, but you might find that you prefer Launcher if the learning curve for LCP is steep.

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🔗 Why Reach Navigation Should Replace the Navbar in iOS Design

Speaking from the perspective of a user interface nerd, I found this blog post from Brad Ellis to be very interesting.

Why Reach Navigation Should Replace the Navbar in iOS Design:

The UINavigationBar, navbar for short, has been around since the original iPhone. Historically, navbars have been convenient and clear, easy to understand and easy to build.

Then phones ballooned, enough that the iPhone 7 Plus supplanted sales of the iPad mini. Now, if you own a modern iPhone, navbars can feel unwieldy — literally out of touch.

Burgeoning screens mean the distance between the navbar and our thumbs has grown. The screen on a 7 Plus is so tall it would take a thumb-length increase of 150 percent to reach those pesky buttons with one hand. Just another knuckle or two. Nothing weird.

As devices change, our visual language changes with them. It’s time to move away from the navbar in favor of navigation within thumb-reach. For the purposes of this article, we’ll call that Reach Navigation.

🔗 My Headphones, My Self – NYTimes.com

This is a fun article from back in December…

My Headphones, My Self – NYTimes.com:

You see them on every block: people being propelled through their routines listening to their own individualized soundtracks, with the outside world serving as a stage set.

Headphones are now fashion statements. Status symbols. Fetish objects on par with luxury watches and limited-edition Nikes.

I also liked this quote:

“Headphones are the front line of urban social defense,” said Julie Klausner, a comedian, actor and writer. “I’m introverted and socially anxious by nature. My worst nightmare is sitting next to someone on a plane or someone who wants to strike up a conversation on an elevator.”

🔗 iOS 11 Tidbits from Mac Rumors

iOS 11 Tidbits: Customizable Control Center, One-Handed Keyboard, Type to Siri and More – Mac Rumors:

iOS 11 introduces a huge number of major changes to the operating system, ranging from a redesigned Control Center experience to a host of new features specific to the iPad, but along with all of these major changes, outlined in our iOS 11 announcement post, there are also dozens of smaller changes that have been added to the beta.

Below, we’ve outlined some of the smaller but still significant tweaks that went unmentioned during Apple’s whirlwind keynote announcement.

I love articles like this. In the coming weeks, people who are running the iOS 11 beta will likely be discovering all of the nice little features that there wasn’t time in the keynote to address. Every once in a while, I find that there is one little minor change that is going to solve a daily frustration for me. A few from this that really resonate with me are…

Type to Siri (an accessibility setting allowing you to type Siri inquires rather than saying them)
Customizable Control Center
Offload Unused Apps (auto delete apps that haven’t been opened in a while)
Drag and Drop for iPhone (does not work across apps though)
AirPod settings (now, double tapping the right side can perform a different ask than tapping the left side)
Screen recording (will be awesome for making how-to videos and recording Snapchat videos

What did Apple check off on my WWDC wishlist?

A few weeks ago, I detailed my wishlist for WWDC. Below, I have reposted it with what Apple actually announced. My assessment over whether or not a feature was announced is based on whether or not the feature was announced verbally during the keynote, not on a slide or later discovered within the OS.

MACOS

-News app to mirror the one on iOS NOPE

-improvements to pro apps (Final Cut Pro X and Logic Pro X) and additions to the Photos app NOPE

-splitting iTunes up into separate apps like what is on iOS: separate app for Music, TV, Podcasts, and iTunes Store NOPE

IOS

-default apps (won’t happen) NOPE

-serious overhaul of iPad productivity (better file system, better home screen, drag and drop, better multitasking, more control over audio ins and outs) YESX100

TVOS

-PiP NOPE

-Ability to watch TV content from two apps at once NOPE

-ability to command with Siri without the Remote app (for example, I want to say to my phone, “hey Siri watch Game of Thrones,” and have it turn on the TV, launch the HBO app and start the most recent episode) NOPE

-ability to sync all Apple TVs in the house so that they show the same video at once (for parties…also, this won’t happen) NOPE

WATCHOS

-smart contexts: ability to change Watch face, complications, and notifications based on sensitivity to time and location CHECK, Siri watchface

-better audio controls (easier to access Now Playing screen, complications to play and pause audio, ability to scroll the crown for volume and use hardware buttons for control whenever audio has recently been playing) CHECK, sort of with swipe to audio controls within Workout app

GENERAL

-Siri improvements (more reliable, faster, more open to third party apps, better integration with tvOS, local dictation and basic commands CHECK

-AirPods with always listening Siri NOPE

-improvements to iCloud Drive (shared folders, files, and URLs) CHECK definitely to shared files, but not sure about others

Here are some of my favorite features that reddit users replied with:

-Multiple iOS user logins NOPE

-Hey Siri on Mac NOPE

-custom watch faces NOPE

-open CarPlay up to more developers (pasrticular third party maps apps and messenging apps) NOPE

-iOS dark mode NOPE

-Workflow integration NOPE

-Open up NFC to third party apps CHECK

-Apple Pay your friends and family over iMessage CHECK

-Apple Music continuity NOPE

Great iOS 11 concept video

Check out this expertly executed concept video of features that Federico Viticci hopes will come to the iPad in iOS 11.

I use my iPad for getting work done more and more everyday. There are still a lot of hurdles in the software for getting work done. I think Federico has done a great job illustrating how some of these problems could be solved in an elegant way that doesn’t confuse the intuitive nature of iOS.

I will loose my mind if Apple announces a file management feature anything like the Finder demoed in this video. Apple’s developer conference kicks off with a keynote at 1 pm on June 5 where they are expected to announce next years iOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS feature updates. Announcements of some hardware products, including a Siri powered speaker to rival the Amazon Echo, are also rumored to appear.

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New iPhone Announcement, September 7, 2016 – Reflections

Apple announced the Apple Watch Series 2, the iPhone 7, and a new set of wireless AirPods this past Wednesday. I wanted to take a hot second to jot down some quick reflections on some of the announcements. These are in somewhat chronological order.

Just one brief note: I went into watching this event without any real interest in purchasing anything announced.

Mario

Not sure what it is, but the announcement of a Mario game coming to iOS made me feel like a seven year old. It looks to have the characteristic tightness and polish I expect from Nintendo games. I will definitely buy and play this game. Also very cool that it is going to be a fixed price and not have in app purchases.

iWork

Oh boy. Anytime iWork gets mentioned, I sit up in my seat a little. It was announced that iWork is getting real time collaborative features (yeah yeah, just like Google Docs in 2007). The cool thing is that collaborators can be working on Pages, Numbers, and Keynote documents from on the web or in the native applications on Mac or iOS. As these apps are my primary tools of choice for making docs, spreadsheets, and presentations, I am pumped that Apple is working on this.

Sadly, these features depend on the reliability of iCloud sync to be awesome. If these newer features work as well as existing iWork document sync, I am going to need see them in action first hand before getting too excited.

Pokemon Go for Apple Watch

Again, I found myself surprised that one of the most exciting announcements for me was about a game. Pokemon Go is the perfect fit for Apple Watch. It will resolve every reason that I do not currently play the game often (even though I find it entertaining and aspire to play it more).

The app reconciles the fact that playing Pokemon Go is basically a workout and therefore tracks your calories and distance as you play and records this data to the Apple Health app. It tells you when Pokemon are near as you walk so that you don’t have to be staring at your screen the entire time, ignoring the moment and running your battery dry.

I will play this game a ton.

Apple Watch Series 2

I was not planning to be excited about this device but it might be the most compelling thing to me about the entire presentation. Apple Watch Series 2 brings GPS, waterproofing, speed increase, and water related workouts to the watch and also has some new and cool designs.

The Nike+ version of the watch has a breathable sport band and comes with some extra software installed to help track runs and motivate the user to get outside.

I have the stainless steel version of the original Apple Watch but I have bounced around the idea of getting a cheaper aluminum model just for the work out features and speed increase. It was also announced that watchOS 3 will come out next Wednesday, September 13th. This update is advertised to improve speed so much that it will feel like a new watch. So far, reviews have indicated that the hype is real. I will wait to see how much faster my watch feels next week before deciding if I really want a the new model.

iPhone 7

Well, they really did it. They took away the headphone jack. Honestly, I think this is where the technology needs to go, but as an audio professional, I think I am going to introduce a lot of friction into my life for the next year if I early adopt this technology. I still want the ability to plug my phone into any sound system I come across, and while using a Lightning to 1/8th inch adaptor is not a huge hassle for me, I would really rather just not deal with it. Eventually I do believe the entire industry will move this way, but I really wish that in pushing things forward, Apple had gone with a standard solution like a USB C cable, not one that is proprietary like Lightning.

Audio jack aside, the new camera features on the phone look compelling and I am definitely interested in them. Maybe next time around…

AirPods

Along with the audio jack removal, Apple announced a new set of wireless “AirPods” that are designed just like the ones that come in the box, but without wires. The AirPods come in a chargeable case that charges the pods itself. As soon as you take them out of the case, they immediately pair to whatever Apple device you want to use them with (Mac, Apple Watch, iPhone) in one tap. They seamlessly pass audio from one of these devices to the other in one tap without fiddling with Bluetooth settings. They allow you to talk to Siri and get a couple hours of playback from a few seconds of charge.

If you have seen the product photography of these, the potential for loosing them is immediately obvious. That being said, I am very compelled by these devices because they are the only one in the presentation that actually solve new technological problems for me in a user friendly way. If these don’t sound like garbage and fit my ears, I will definitely buy them. If you are compelled by these but fear of loosing them, Apple’s headphone company, Beats, is also releasing three new wireless headphone models that use them same pairing technology as the Apple AirPods. Each of the Beats models have a wire to attach the two ear pieces together.

Conclusion

I think for me, it is looking like:

iPhone: I’ll wait.

Apple Watch: See how fast watchOS 3 feels first.

AirPods: See how they sound and fit first. If the fit is bad, consider Beats.

Apple improves iCloud Music Library matching, ditches copy-protected matched files for Apple Music users

Apple improves iCloud Music Library matching, ditches copy-protected matched files for Apple Music users:

When Apple Music was released just over a year ago, Apple also debuted iCloud Music Library, a way of storing your iTunes library in the cloud. There were two ways to seed the cloud, either with iTunes Match or Apple Music. If you were an iTunes Match subscriber, matching your songs in your local library to your cloud library was done one way, and if you were just an Apple Music subscriber, matching was done differently.

This created some confusion about the way tracks were matched and stored in iCloud Music Library. Now, Apple is changing this, and will use the same matching method for both services. The company said in a briefing that Apple Music now uses acoustic fingerprinting and provides matched files without digital rights management (DRM), or copy protection, just like iTunes Match.

It seriously blows my mind that this isn’t the way it worked from the start. Even after reading this article, I am still unsure if it is safe to cancel my iTunes Match subscription or not.

Subscribing to Apple Music is a huge risk on my part. For the record, I keep two local back ups and one cloud back up of music files in addition to my iTunes Match/Apple Music subscriptions. I of all people want Apple Music to succeed but things like this make me wonder why Apple isn’t doing more to secure their footing as a musically relevant tech company.

For the times that Apple Music works as I want it to, it is still worth the experiment. More often than not, it syncs my iTunes Library across all of my Macs and iOS devices. But there are still frequent syncing bugs, in particular, the accuracy of metadata like album art and song titles. And don’t get me started on how my MacBook frequently logs me out of my account. At the end of the day though, Apple Music shows potential to be much more than other streaming services..

If you are looking for a music subscription service like Spotify or Google Music, I think Apple Music is getting close enough to complete. But if you are more like me, and you keep a vast library of rare and live albums, personally created and uploaded mp3s, and rely on iTunes to get your job done, it might not be worth the headache.

My favorite apps of 2015

I feel the need to defend these apps in a way that I didn’t for my favorite albums of 2015 list I posted yesterday. In part, this is because music’s role in my life has a certain type of inevitability that makes it difficult for me to immediately understand its value myself. Secondly, the music I experienced this past year is worth so many more words than I could possibly type. Finally, apps, especially paid ones, tend to require a defense; a “why do I need to buy this?” Their value is also often technical and practical, and can be condensed down into a few sentences.

Productivity

Documents by Readdle

I can’t remember what getting work done on an iPad or iPhone felt like before discovering this app. Think of this as the missing Finder on iOS.

Due

My new favorite for setting timers and reminders. I like how persistently it bugs me until I actually complete the task.

Workflow

Unbelievable automator for creating multi step workflows on iOS.

Scannable

For getting all physical paper into the cloud as beautifully formatted, text searchable, PDFs. Syncs effortlessly to Evernote, lightning fast, and zero step scanning.

Apple Notes

Stellar update this year to the notes app that comes bundled with Apple devices. I love the rich text formatting, web clipping, and list support.

OmniGraffle

A great app by the makers of two of my favorites: OmniFocus and OmniOutliner. OmniGraffle has come to replace Adobe Illustrator for me. It is my go-to for designing graphics. Specifically, I use it to design seating charts for my classes.

IFTTT

Amazing service for linking different internet connected services and devices. You can create if-then statements to automate them. Example: If I am tagged in a Facebook post, save that photo to my Dropbox. Another example: When I arrive at home, then turn on the lights in my house.

Paprika

Cooking game changer! My wife and I clip recipes from the web into this app and it formats them beautifully so we can isolate ingredients, directions, and set timers. It has a built in grocery list and meal planning feature that can send data to Apple Reminders and Calendar apps, respectively.

Overcast

I have been listening to a lot of podcasts this year. Overcast offers the best experience of all the podcast apps I have tried.

Music

forScore

Not a new app to me but I have really taken to organizing my scores on the iPad with this app over the last year. It has truly revolutionized my musical workflow throughout my band directing, private teaching, gigging, and church music directing jobs.

Tempo

Still my favorite metronome app on iOS.

Tunable

My favorite tuning app. Features gamified tuning, polyphonic tuning drones, just intonation, and simultaneous metronome and tuner playback.

Health

Using these apps (and more) in combination with the Apple Health app and Apple Watch, I have lost about 30 pounds since late August. Ok, really, I worked out and changed my diet some, but the apps helped.

Waterminder

Helps me set goals for water consumption and see my progress each day. Logging water is easy with the Apple Watch app and all data syncs to the Apple Health app.

Lark

This app is fun for tracking work outs and food, but I use it primarily to track the hours I sleep each night. It accomplishes this through the motion of my iPhone.

myfitnesspal

I have been using this app to track calorie and nutrition data for almost a year now. Really easy and addictive to use once you get into a routine.

Spire

This app, in combination with the wearable tracker by the same name, has allowed me to track trends in my breathing for the last few months. The app categorizes my breathing patterns into “focus,” “tense,” “calm,” and “activity.” When it senses a streak of tension, it sends my watch a message to breathe slower. It also allows me to set goals for minutes of focus per day, offers guided meditation, and syncs respiratory rate data to Apple Health.

Home

All of these require home automated hardware to be useful. By recommending them, I am recommending the devices themselves as well.

Harmony

Automated TV remote. No more fuss over HDMI inputs and multiple remotes. This app controls all of the things plugged into my TV and allows me to trigger different things on and off with simple one tap button presses.

Philips Hue

Lights that connect to wifi. These can be controlled from a phone app, automated with services like IFTTT, and commanded with Siri.

Sonos

High quality speakers that connect to one another over a home wifi network.

Games

Crossy Road

Shooty Skies

PAC-MAN 265

iOS 9

iOS 9 was released this past week. I have been running the beta on my iPhone and iPad since late July and it is just really a great update.

Here are a few unsorted thoughts on the update:

– Battery life. Battery management has improved tremendously. I can actually get through most days using my phone like a normal person without needing a recharge at 3pm. Low power mode is also a nice touch. At 20 percent, my phone offers to conserve battery life by doing things like turning down the backlight and restricting apps from running in the background.

– Power features on iPad. Now the iPad can view two apps on the screen at once. You can also close out of an app you are watching a video on and the video will stay visible in the corner of the screen even when you leave and enter into other apps. I also love the keyboard update. Dragging with two fingers on the iPad keyboard turns it into a curser. No more pressing and holding to use that flakey magnifying glass.

– Spotlight for all apps! Now any app can allow you to search its contents from the Spotlight search, making it really easy to search apps like Dropbox and Documents. Sadly, Evernote has not enabled this feature yet.

– Siri is quiet. Small thing. But I love that Siri does not make a “boop” sound when activated anymore.

– Proactivity. Now my phone tells me when I need to leave for my next appointment based on my calendar and traffic info. It also searches the signatures of emails sent to me to suggest the names of people who are calling me if their names are not in my contacts list. Some of these features are lackluster. For example, going to the Spotlight search is supposed to suggest to you the apps you use and the people it thinks you might want to interact with based on usage patterns. I have found it to more often just suggest recently opened apps. But I have been noticing all sorts of other features of this nature that Apple has quietly added. For example, today I got in my car and booted up Apple Maps. The first option for directions was to my friend’s house. The address had a mail icon next to it. I can only assume that Maps looked in my mail and saw the email from that friend inviting me to a party, including both that days date and his address, so it connected the dots and suggested that I might be driving there at that time. Fantastic!

– Another great example of Proactivity. Every morning, I launch an app that my school system uses to take student attendance on. Now, around the start of my first period class every morning, my iPad has been showing me a tiny version of the icon for that app in the lower left corner of the screen. All I have to do is touch it and swipe up to instantly launch into that app.

– You can now search for different parts of the Settings app!

– The new system wide font looks great.

– Maps is smarter and more accurate than ever before.

– Reminders stay on the lock screen until they are checked off to be extra remind-y.

– The new Notes app is awesome. But it is just not going to replace Evernote for me.

If you have been scared to update an Apple device before due to them being buggy or taking up too much space, I would still encourage you to download iOS 9 immediately. Not only does it have all the features listed above and more, but it really does feel a hundred more times polished than the updates of the past few years.

Here are a few of my favorite reviews of the operating system so far:

iOS 9: The MacStories Review, Created on iPad | FEDERICO VITICCI

iOS 9 Review | RENE RITCHIE