About shortcut actions in Today View
When you launch shortcuts from Today View on an iOS device, keep in mind that some actions open the Shortcuts app to finish the job, complicating your workflow. When deciding on which shortcuts to add to Today View, try to avoid those with actions that:
Preview content such as the Quick Look action
Ask you to enter text
Ask you to pick dates
Use the camera or microphone
Ask you to select photos, music or contacts
Use the Ask Each Time variable
Have actions with a Show Compose Sheet or Show File Picker option turned on
Change the screen brightness
The following actions are good candidates for shortcuts that can be launched and completed entirely from Today View:
Ask for Input
Use the Ask for Input action to enter numbers in shortcuts in Today View. In the example below, the calculator appears after you tap the Calculate Tip shortcut in Today View.
For example, you could use Ask for Input with the Log Health Sample action to create a widget shortcut for logging your weight. When run, the shortcut opens a number pad in the widget for typing in your weight.
When you add an Ask for Input action to a shortcut that you plan to run from Today View, make sure to set Input Type to Number.
Get Clipboard
Use the Get Clipboard action to bring content into a shortcut in Today View. When apps don’t provide the ability to share, you can copy what you want to the clipboard, then run a shortcut in Today View to process the content or send it somewhere else.
For example, the Save to Dropbox shortcut uses the Copy to Clipboard action to add copied content to Dropbox. Using this shortcut from Today View, you can send multiple passages from one or more documents to Dropbox, appending each piece of copied information to the same Dropbox file.
Choose from List, Choose from Menu
Use the Choose from List and Choose from Menu actions to make selections from a list of options in Today View. Straight from the widget, you can make choices that change how the shortcut operates.
For example, using the Choose from List action, you can set up a shortcut that displays a list of songs to play. A more complicated shortcut might use the Choose from Menu action to branch the shortcut and run a series of actions based on the option chosen.
For details, see Choose from List action and Use the Choose from Menu action in Shortcuts.
Show Alert
Use the Show Alert action to display alerts or to ask for a confirmation in Today View. When a shortcut reaches an alert, a message with an OK button (and sometimes a Cancel button), is displayed.
Some tasks are too memory-intensive for Today View. Shortcuts dealing with high volumes of content or large file sizes may need to open in Shortcuts to finish.
Note: If “Unable to Load” is displayed in Today View, the Shortcuts widget has run out of memory. As a workaround, add a Continue Shortcut in App action near the beginning of your shortcut. When the shortcut reaches the Continue Shortcut in App action, the Shortcuts app opens to finish the shortcut (which is no longer subject to the memory limitations of the widget environment).