Convert image or pdf, resize, save, rename and extract alt text with two taps

One of my regular tasks is updating the front page of our regional library website, either adding upcoming events or removing finished events. Our front page is a grid of event flyers with an expandable accordion under the flyer that contains a text description of the event, usually very similar to the flyer itself. A staff member emails the flyer with the accompanying text.

The gist of my process is to have Mail and Textastic open side-by-side for easy copy/pasting. The attached flyer images are a mix of pdf, jpg or png. In the past I would have saved to Photos then selected them all and used a Shortcut to export to the website’s folder in Files, converting them all to jpegs at a preset size and quality. Quick and easy. But in recent months I’ve added a new step to the shortcut to extract the text of the flyer and add it to the clipboard. Now I can paste the text into the image alt tags. I’m not sure why I didn’t add that step in earlier.

The only downside is that I can only do one image at a time which isn’t too bad as the typical email only has 2 to 4 such files. I now just select the file in Mail, select share then use the Shortcut which saves the image to the site images folder, renames it from the original but with no spaces then copies the new name and the extracted text to the clipboard. Then I tap to Textastic and paste. I still have to spend a minute there to move the file name text to the correct location in the html and clean-up any errors in the text extraction but it works pretty well and the whole process only takes a few seconds after I paste.

Shortcuts is a fantastic timesaver for repetitive tasks and it’s an app I keep finding new ways to use.

I don’t often speculate about upcoming Apple announcements but I’m going to make an exception with this post. And it’s nothing complicated, just putting a few pieces together. Most of it is probably pretty obvious to folks who have been paying attention Apple news over recent months. Before I continue, for anyone not familiar with my blog, I’m a full-time, very satisfied iPad Pro user. I’m not someone who struggles with the iPad, not someone who longs for macOS on the iPad. For me, iPadOS sings and my interest is in seeing what Apple does to refine the iPad experience rather than any hope of a macOS to iPad face-plant, er, transplant.

May 29, 2023. We’re a week past the release of Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for the iPad. Apple first announced the release on May 9th and it took everyone by surprise. It’s always fun when they can still surprise everyone! Boom. And, interesting that such a significant announcement is done by a press release a month before WWDC. For the most part the reviews have been very positive. The two most repeated critiques of FCP for iPad: No round tripping to and from the Mac and no editing off of external hard drives. But given this is the initial release, it seems reasonable to expect that these two features will be added before long.

We’re one week away from WWDC 2023. The rumors of a VR/AR headset have been buzzing for the past year. In recent months it’s been rumored that the headset would be running many of Apple’s apps in an iPad-like form. Many assume the headset is now a certainty that will be announced at WWDC 2023.

While much of the excitement about WWDC 2023 has centered on speculation about the headset, it’s OS and features, I’m curious about the connection that might exist between the headset and the iPad or, more specifically, the potential commonality between the two operating systems.  Given the rumor that the headset will, essentially, be running iPad apps, this seems a relevant question to consider. Given the need for energy efficiency, it would make sense that the OS running the headset would be more like iOS or iPadOS than macOS. If true, well, then there is now a new category of hardware that runs on the iOS family.

Another rumor, discussed far less, is a larger iPad Pro, perhaps 15 or 16″. With the release of FCP and Logic Pro for iPad, a larger iPad Pro would make a lot of sense. And of course with these new pro apps, it also starts to seem inevitable that Xcode for the iPad will be released. We’ve seen some big improvements to Swift Playgrounds in the past couple years but still no Xcode.

Last year we saw quite a few improvements to iPadOS and the stock iPad apps. Much of this was overshadowed by a few prominent pundits that disliked the implementation of Stage Manager. I’m not going to dwell on that other than to say that the negativity around the feature is greatly overblown. Though not what some wanted, many of us use it and actually like it. It’s certainly made my iPad experience much better, allowing me to use 3-4 apps at once. It’s been a real and measurable productivity boost for the work I do. At the very least, it is Apple’s first step towards an improved multitasking experience on the iPad.

But looking at the improvements brought to iPadOS over the past 2 to 3 years, we have an OS that is has steadily matured. The Files app has had many previously missing features added and is now fully functional, nearly on par with the Mac Finder. Stock apps like Notes, Mail, Safari, Reminders have all seen significant improvements.

Putting the puzzle pieces together
If the rumors are true it would seem that Apple has also been developing the headset and its OS for awhile. For several years they’ve been publicly promoting Augmented Reality and LiDAR with new hardware and software features on the iPhone and iPad. Tim Cook has been outspoken of his support of AR during that time.

In a week Apple will begin to provide more details about where this journey is going and how they expect these devices to work together. Given previous years development of the larger Apple ecosystem, it seems likely that not much has been left to chance. Apple has a well thought out plan that it’s been following. It would seem a given that the time and energy put into the development of LiDAR and AR in iOS and iPadOS has been a part of the process of developing the OS and hardware for the headset.

Of particular interest to me: how will the features and technology put into the headset OS overlap or come back to iPadOS?

My expectations and hopes for the iPad in 2023 and 2024 is that Apple will continue to fill out and refine the OS and the default apps. I think most of this list is just an obvious continuation of what we’ve already seen.

What I’m hoping or expecting to see in terms of iPadOS and apps:

• Files: More customizable tool bar, more complete indexing of file contents for better search results, more column options in list view
• Improved or added support for smart lists, saved searches in apps like Files, Mail, Notes, Reminders, Contacts
• Improved Safari bringing it ever closer to the full desktop experience
• Improvements for Stage Manager and multitasking
• Improvements to virtual memory and background tasks for apps like Final Cut Pro
• While Pages, Numbers and Keynote are all excellent apps, there’s more to do to bring them fully in-line with the Mac apps
• As the new app in the Apple ecosystem, Freeform could use some big improvements. This app should really shine on the iPad.
• FCP: To start I’d expect to have the above mentioned missing features addressed: round tripping to and from the Mac, editing from external storage
• Xcode. I’d guess that in 2023 Swift Playgrounds will again be improved but that we’ll also see Xcode for iPad. First to what will be described as Xcode lite and then to something closer to the full version.
• Improved Lock Screen that will bring last year’s iPhone Lock Screen improvements to the iPad
• Improved widgets, perhaps with new options for interaction

An iPad Pro 15 or 16″. Along with this I’d hope/expect to see other iPad accessories as Apple broadens the iPad platform. A new version of the Magic Keyboard. The iPad Pro needs better battery life, I’m hoping we’ll see this in the form of a new Magic Keyboard with an integrated battery that can charge the iPad. I imagine the Brydge form factor but with more ports. I can imagine this combination being the iPad Studio. Larger iPad, FaceTime camera moved to the long side, M3, detachable Magic Keyboard that boosts the iPad to 20 hours of battery life. I’d expect it to have the same battery life as a MacBook Pro but weighing in a bit more as it would be 2 batteries. Also, maybe a redesigned Magic Keyboard for the current line of 13″ iPad Pro and a new M3 13″ iPad Pro.

In short I expect that Apple will double down on its commitment to the iPad platform: hardware, iPadOS, Pro apps and accessories.

Last, a few words on the larger Apple Ecosystem and the new headset as the new TV

• iCloud Pro?
• More sharing, collaboration and development of the iCloud and app ecosystem into a more complete social network.
• Whatever is happening with the headset I’d expect Apple to market it as the new TV. Talking to family members that all have iPhones, I’ve recently become more aware of their media consumption habits. It’s more individualistic than I realized. It occurs to me that the long-term vision of the headset might simply be the new TV: Movies, shows, sports and as a general purpose computer. I’d speculate that Apple hopes that in 5 years homes with iPhone users will have 1 or more headsets that have replaced flatscreen tvs.

Yet another installment of an “Apple pundit ignores the facts to write a clickbait story about the limitations of iPadOS”. It’s a bummer that they just make stuff up to fit their preferred narrative. Filipe Espósito over at 9to5Mac in his work of fiction, Final Cut for iPad highlights iPadOS limitations:

This week, Apple finally released Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for the iPad – two highly anticipated apps for professionals. While this is a step in the right direction, these apps highlight the limitations of iPadOS.

I tried using Final Cut for the iPad, but…
I wasn’t expecting the iPad version to have all the features available on the Mac in version 1.0. However, the limitations go beyond what I was expecting. And some of these limitations are due to how iPadOS works.

The “limitations” he attributes to iPadOS:

• That FCP does not allow editing off of an external SSD is true but it’s a limitation of FCP. LumaFusion and DaVinci Resolve both have this feature
• The lack of some keyboard shortcuts in FCP has nothing to do with iPadOS
• The interaction of FCP with Stage Manager is critiqued but again, this is how Apple has implemented FCP. I’ve not used DaVinci Resolve but LumaFusion has no problem with Stage Manager on the iPad screen or full screen on an external screen. It’s excellent.
• Round-tripping a FCP project from iPad to Mac and back. Again, this is likely a limitation of FCP not iPadOS.

Using LumaFusion on the iPad with an external display

Okay, background export of a movie. To some degree this is a limitation of FCP but also I suspect iPadOS. Certainly Apple made it a choice to not allow it. Using an M1 iPad Pro with 8 GB of memory it’s possible to do a background export with LumaFusion. I just did it. That said, it does fail if I try to do many other tasks with LumaFusion in the background the whole time. I can hop to Notes or Mail or Safari with no problem. But if I were to leave an export in the background and try to hop from Notes to Mail to Safari then back to the export it will have failed. I’d guess that an iPad with 16 GB of memory would do better. And I’d guess that more could be done with iPadOS to allow for apps to be given priority for such background tasks.

Espósito concludes, “And with all these limitations, I’ve given up using Final Cut on the iPad. I’m sure a lot of first-time video makers will have a great time using Final Cut on the iPad. But for those professional users, having a Mac is still the way to go. Hopefully, iPadOS 17 can put an end to some of these limitations.”

He seems to consider himself a “professional” but I would think a professional journalist would have more regard for the truth. Ignoring or distorting the facts to fit a narrative doesn’t make much of a case that one’s journalism is professional.

For at least a couple years the Apple pundit mantra has been “the iPad isn’t pro unless Apple brings its pro apps to it”. Well, Apple has begun that process last week with the announcement of Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for iPad. As I expected the primarily Mac using pundits are moving the goal posts. Here’s one example that popped up today from Dan Moren in his Stay Foolish column at Macworld, Final Cut Pro changes everything and nothing about the iPad:

This past week, Apple once again took a step towards the idea of the iPad as the modern-day computer replacement with its long-awaited announcement of Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for the platform–but is it too little, too late?

“Is it too little, too late?” See, right off, it’s not enough. For long-time Mac users nothing Apple does with the iPad will ever make it explicitly a Mac and so the goal posts will always be shifting. Moren mentions Xcode as another missing pro app. In recent years Apple has added new features to Swift Playgrounds, making it a more capable app and I suspect that Apple will, eventually, bring Xcode to the iPad which will move the iPad closer to being complete. But that won’t be enough either.

Hopefully Apple will add the audio input/output features podcasters like Federico Viticci have been asking for. But that’s a very tiny group of users and while it will satisfy that particular need, again, it won’t be enough. The goal posts will move again and again.

Jumping right to the end of Moren’s article, he suggests an iPad that shifts over to being a Mac when connected to a keyboard:

The idea of a device that works as a Mac while connected to a keyboard and an iPad while detached might seem like an unholy Frankstein’s toaster fridge to some, but after 13 years of the iPad, I’d argue that people are pretty comfortable with going back and forth between two (or more) separate devices with different interfaces. Why not find a way to consolidate them?

This is really is what Mac users want. They want a touch screen Mac and evidence thus far seems to indicate that they’ll never be happy with iPadOS. Which is totally fine, it’s not for them. But perhaps they should just move along and be happy with their Macs. And yet, they continue to linger on the iPad. It’s almost as if their Macs are incomplete, not quite enough for them. But they seem stuck between devices that they’re not quite happy with.

Moren writes:

What we’re all looking for, ultimately, is the right tool for the job.

Mac users contend that that tool is the Mac, that it is the more complete computer. My suggestion and hope for them is that they can just accept the Mac and move on. Be happy with your Mac. When you need a portable touch screen be happy with your iPhone. Or add in an iPad Mini for your content consumption. Not every device is for you.

I’ve written here many times about my gradual transition to being a full time iPad user. It was gradual and complete. I learned iPadOS and became comfortable with it. With each new iteration of iPadOS I’ve been more satisfied as new features were added. But throughout that time I’ve generally been satisfied, no, delighted by the iPad. I don’t spend my time longing for the iPad to have Mac features or to have it be a Mac. I wish the same for Mac users, that they can learn to be satisfied with what they have in the Mac and not spend so much time wishing for a different computer.

I’m generally not big on hot takes so gave myself a few days to consider before attempting a blog post. As for the news of Final Cut Pro and Logic Pro for the iPad, well, fantastic! Personally, I don’t do much video editing. I’ve currently got a personal/family project going in LumaFusion. My next project might be in FCP just for the fun of learning it. Way back around 2001 -2005 I spent some time doing video work and learned FCP but I’ve not had much use for it since then. I’m looking forward to giving it a go.

But to the larger question of the apps, the platform and the response thus far, as I’ve written about before the loudest complaints about the lack of Apple Pro apps for the iPad seems to come from Apple/tech focused pundits, podcasters, and YouTubers. Some in the first two categories have already admitted in their hot takes on the new release that the don’t actually use those two apps so… 🙄 I expect they’ll keep complaining about the lack of Xcode even though most of them also do not use that.

As for the Apple/tech YouTubers I predict that it will shake out like this: those that have very expensive FCP desktop set-ups will keep using those most of the time for most of their work. Why wouldn’t they if they already have invested so much in a desk-top based workflow? But many of the folks that prefer a mobile workflow away from the desk will try out FCP for iPad and many will use it, prefer it. And of course there will be those that loudly share how it’s not good enough or how it’s still held back by iPadOS. 🙄

Other categories of users: iPad first folks that have been happily using LumaFusion. Some of them will switch over to FCP but others will stay with LumaFusion because it allows editing projects using media from an external drive. LF is pretty feature rich and I suspect many of its users will remain with it.

Then there are the DaVinci Resolve users. It’s relatively new on iPad and I suspect it’s user base consists of folks that were/are also serious users of the desktop version of DaVinci Resolve. They’ll stay with DaVinci Resolve. And some are probably LumaFusion users that are trying out DR as an experiment. They’ll probably also try out FCP and some of them will end up switching. I’m guessing these folks are kind of up in the air at the moment.

FCP/Logic on the iPad don’t seem to be “lite” versions but full versions with a touch-adapted interface. Some features are missing from FCP like round-tripping and editing from files on an external drive will likely be added in an update. But also, these apps seem to be aimed at younger users that are focused on creating for social media like TikTok, Instagram, YouTube. I suspect that there will be some solid adoption there.

In it’s first promo video Apple is touting fast turn-around, quick production on the iPad using it as both camera and editor. For some this will be attractive.

But thinking about the Continuity camera feature that allows for an iPhone to be used with a Mac for live FaceTime calls, I can imagine a new feature with iOS 17 where such live video allows for capture from iPhone to an iPad running FCP. This would seem to be a pretty attractive feature in certain scenarios. But the point is this is just the first shoe to drop in FCP for iPad, new features will come and given Apple’s track record of ecosystem integration, I can imagine we can expect to see them offer up features like the above.

I’d guess it won’t be too long before we see a new version of FCP for Mac that further leverages the hardware ecosystem with round tripping from iPad to Mac and adding in the iPhone as a live camera feed for Mac FCP as well. Again, just my speculation.

I’m glad to see Apple deliver these apps if for no other reason then it might dampen some of the continued complaining from the primarily Mac using pundits. It also boosts the notion that Apple is committed to the iPad as a platform. Mac users not happy with the iPad should just move on. Those that want to use the iPad as their computer can continue doing so but with added assurance that Apple continues to take the iPad seriously.

A few related links of note:

iJustine actually had some hands on time: her video

Dylan Bates, a Final Cut Pro YouTuber offers his thoughts FCP for iPad. Not surprisingly, there were several FCP using YouTubers offering their takes based the above linked promo video and Apple’s website.

And Jason Snell at Six Colors offered his thoughts

As is common with many Apple nerds, I like to play with text apps. My primary purpose is blogging which has also served as a journal of sorts.

For quite a long time I used ByWord for this. Then Ulysses then iA Writer. iA Writer stuck longer than almost anything else. Then a brief dalliance with Obsidan, Taio, and Notebooks. I’ve spent the past few months with Notebooks which has served pretty well. Review here. The only problem there is that it continues to be somewhat wonky. It’s a great app but often feels buggy. So I’ve been using it as a partner with iA Writer. Where Notebooks shines is in adding images for blog posts. I can copy a single or multiple images from Photos then insert into a Notebooks draft. Not only does the app downsize from full quality but inserts each as a Markdown link. If I move the file to a folder it also moves the images to a corresponding sub folder. It works fantastically.

So, why mess with it if it’s working? Yesterday in the Mac Break Weekly podcast Andy Ihnatko recommended Day One for journaling. I’d never tried it. There’s a free option so I downloaded it. My thought being, hmm, perhaps I could have a private journal in addition to blogging? Okay, will try it. Then thought, hmmm, I could also use this for blogging. I always gravitate to blogging.

I spent an hour with it and loved it. All except for the fact that using the arrow keys while writing/editing text does not move the cursor up or down, left or right, but navigates the files. Ugh. Well, that’s a show stopper. No setting I could find to change it. But so much to like about the app other than that.  Edit to add that upon trying this again today, well, it works as expected. Unless it was something wonky with my keyboard I’ll have to say it was user error. 😬

The free version does have other limitations such as no sync between devices, only one image per post, only one journal. So, with these things in mind I started thinking again about Apple’s Notes app.

In the past I’d thought to try to make Notes work as a part of my blogging process. It didn’t quite take. So, this morning, I’ve spent a couple hours tinkering. I whipped up a Shortcut to create a new note with a template similar to the default Day One posts. Basically, just the date, weather and a default Journal hashtag. Also spent more time really looking at the organizing possibilities of Notes. It’s not that complicated but I’ve never given it a proper go.

Step two, then, was to set up some proper organization in Notes. A mix of folders and smart folders. I’d already tried tags which works well. So, I’ve added a few. I’d like to try the journaling thing as a sort of foundation or addition to the longstanding practice of blogging. In theory, I’d like the journal to contain everything the blogs have with additional private text. So, a dedicated Journal folder. Going forward most new notes will get tagged as Journal. For text that I intend to post to one of my two blogs, those will get additional tags appropriate to the blog. Initially I think everything will go into the Journal folder. If I want to see the blog posts on their own I’ll use a Smart Folder based on the tag. I can always move these later into actual folders if that’s the choice.

My tentative workflow will go something like this. Run a shortcut to start new Journal entries using the template. For blog items, I might just start a new note or, if I’m sharing a link from Safari as I often do I’ll use a Shortcut that converts the article to Markdown and creates a new note. What about blog posts with photos? Well, as it turns out, notes with images can be shared to Notebooks via the share sheet.

Any post, with or without a photo can be easily shared from Notes to Notebooks. So, once I’ve got a post ready for sharing I’ll just send it to Notebooks, hop over to iA Writer which has direct publishing to Micro.blog and WordPress and which has access to my Notebooks folder. With a tap I’ve got the post open then another tap to publish. So, this workflow starts in Notes, ends in iA Writer and I have a copy in the Notes app as well as a discrete Markdown file in iCloud. Exactly what I want.

Downsides? Notes does not have built-in support of Markdown. Apps that do have that support provide convenient one-click formatting or keyboard shortcuts. But it’s not all that hard to type the Markdown code when needed as it’s designed to be simple. Notes tries to do fancy preview links which are nice but not what I want. I don’t think there’s an option to turn that off. But just pasting a url  works.

Editing to add that after originally posting this to the blog someone on Mastodon chimed in that Everlog is another nice journaling app with Markdown support. I’m trying it out and it is excellent and doesn’t have the flaws that Day One has. Now that I’ve got this handy-dandy Notes based system I’m not sure though that I want to abandon it.