Shortcuts 4+

I’ll start this off by saying this could be due to my own technical expertise; however, mostly my shortcuts seem to work great but at times where there is a prompt or alert containing a time/ETA to a destination, there are regular inconsistencies. Despite my home address being consistent, the times generated could range from 1 second arrival (as a test) to 2 hours and 55 mins from my current location which is also my home. In addition, when showing directions to a chosen destination, I often get results for a coffee shop or hotel at the other end of the country, instead of the coffee shop less than a mile from my location.

This could be down to my own limitations, but even some of the curated shortcuts that are already in the app are still inconsistent.

I love the shortcuts app for iOS 12 and it is a really great tool for busy people like me or if you need a prompt start to the day or information quickly. However I have experienced a few problems; 1. Whenever I use Siri to start a shortcuts she takes a minute to just say she is running the shortcuts, then if there are any variables, she won’t actually say them, for example; in shortcuts I’ll get a ETA to a location, but all Siri will say is “your ETA is...” and she won’t actually say it, it’s like this all the time. 2. The widget doesn’t work at all it won’t pop up with any of my shortcuts. 3. I have to launch the app every time if my shortcut uses location services as Apple restricts the usage to while the app is open, which slows down everything, nothing seems so seamless like Apple claims it to be and it’s more a pain than a shortcut. If Apple fixes at least one of these I could recommend this app, but until the. I’d recommend just playing your music, getting your directions, or setting a timer yourself. I was really looking forward to this feature and it seems more like a big let down, but I still think it has amazing concepts and it really can shorten down some annoying tasks.

This app has huge potential, especially now that Apple have acquired it. I am however experiencing many issues with Siri integration and annoying limitations.

1. The app frequently crashes when running shortcuts for me.

2. Sometimes Siri just says ‘continuing in shortcuts’ but nothing is happening after I have said the trigger phrase.

3. If you try and trigger a shortcut from Siri which requires the device to be unlocked (e.g. health data) it doesn’t just ask you to unlock before running but fails to run that part. My biggest use case so far is to make a morning summary action to give me weather for the day, first thing in calendar and sleep analysis.

4. Why can you not select a podcast to play? I have to wait for it to appear as a ‘Siri suggestion’. Additionally, there is no way to make it always play the most recent one. It will just continue with an old episode if it hadn’t completely finished playing last time. With podcasts in shortcuts the most useful action would be to check for a new I played episode from a group of podcasts and play them in order newest first.

5. No way to access weather information (although can open weather app, that is if it appears as a suggestion). I had to use a weather api in my workflow instead. Very pleased you can parse JSON APIs with this though!!

6. Sometimes the show result in Siri doesn’t work by the shortcut continues which is very confusing.