Filed under: iPod Family, Features, Productivity
Mac Automation: Save websites to iPod for later
iPods are great. They allow you to take your complete music library on-the-go, along with some iPod games, and movies. But what if you are in the middle of reading, say, your favorite blog (you know, us), and you want to go somewhere? Well, you certainly don't have to stop reading! I am going to show you how to use Automator to create a workflow that gets the current text from Safari and syncs it to your iPod as a new note.Continue reading to learn how.
Creating the workflow
For this automation, you will need the following Automator actions (in the same order):
- Get Current Webpage from Safari
- Get Text from Webpage
- New iPod Note
Let's tweak some of the settings for the "New iPod Note" action. Click the options button and select "Show this action when the workflow runs" as this will allow you to specify a new name for the note each time you run the workflow. If you would like to save your note by the current date, then you can do so when you run the workflow.
Saving the workflow
You can now save your Automator workflow so you will be able to use it when needed.
To run your workflow, simply open up a new webpage in Safari (it works best when you only have one window and tab opened). Then navigate to the webpage you want to save to your iPod. Whenever you want to save, open the Automator application that you made before. The workflow will take a moment to process the page and retrieve the text. Once it's finished processing the webpage, a dialog will pop-up asking you how you want the iPod note to be saved. Type in a name (or click the "Use current date as name" checkbox) and click the Continue button.
Saving the workflow
You can now save your Automator workflow so you will be able to use it when needed.
- Click File
- Click Save
- Choose "Application" from the "File Format" drop-down menu and specify a name
- Click Save
To run your workflow, simply open up a new webpage in Safari (it works best when you only have one window and tab opened). Then navigate to the webpage you want to save to your iPod. Whenever you want to save, open the Automator application that you made before. The workflow will take a moment to process the page and retrieve the text. Once it's finished processing the webpage, a dialog will pop-up asking you how you want the iPod note to be saved. Type in a name (or click the "Use current date as name" checkbox) and click the Continue button.
Automator will take a couple of seconds to process the file and then place it on the iPod. You can then view the iPod note by going to Extras > Notes > and the name of your saved note. You can then finish reading your article!
Additional Notes
Please note that this doesn't work on the iPhone or iPod touch. In addition, follow these steps to remove notes from your iPod:
Additional Notes
Please note that this doesn't work on the iPhone or iPod touch. In addition, follow these steps to remove notes from your iPod:
- Enable iPod disk use
- In either the sidebar of the Finder, or on your Mac's desktop, double-click on your iPod to view the contents
- Open the "Notes" folder
- Delete unwanted notes and empty the Trash
_thumbnail.jpg "Take a stroll down memory lane")
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Mo said 10:30AM on 2-23-2008
Presumably you could do some kind of similar AppleScript to retrieve the text of the items in an RSS feed (probably easier under Leopard, as you can make feeds work like mailboxes) and you've pretty much got Avantgo right there.
I wish the iPod touch had an offline RSS reader. I have a feeling that'll be fairly high up the list of apps released once the SDK is out (along with VNC and SSH clients).
Reply
metroid87706 said 10:55AM on 2-23-2008
Pretty slick. Automator is the bomb.
Too bad I have a Touch. :(
Reply
Hilko said 11:04AM on 2-23-2008
isn't iWebSaver (http://iWebSaver.com/) a better and easier alternative? It saves the entire page as a bookmark, and can then be synched with the iPod. You retain all formatting, and it works for attachments as well (.doc, .pdf, etc.).
Or am I missing something?
Reply
Macroy said 2:12PM on 2-23-2008
This is for iPod Classics, Video, etc.
Not for Touch or iPhone users who actually have MobileSafari.
Mo said 2:33PM on 2-23-2008
Oh cool, I didn't know that existed. I'm guessing it uses data: URLs to do the magic, which would be a bit neat.
Still doesn't satisfy my hunger for an offline RSS reader, but there are a few things that'll be _really_ useful for.
Peter Zich said 12:09PM on 2-23-2008
Too bad the notes aren't a little more rich in text formatting.
Reply
Floggy said 2:25PM on 2-23-2008
(Shameless plug) That workflow has been around a long time, "Feed to iPod Note":
http://automatorworld.com/archives/category/workflows-actions/ipod/?submit=view
It does need up-converting to Automator 2 format, but it's basically the same workflow.
Reply
Steve said 10:59PM on 2-23-2008
I saw an automator workflow out there that took this to the next level. It took the text from a blog, used text to speech to turned it into an audio file, and saved the audio file to the iPod. Never tried it, but the whole automator business is pretty cool, I must say.
Reply