Stephen_C

As my CleanShot X workflow is now on the Alfred Gallery I thought it better to create a new thread here for it. Version 1.4 has been re-written as a script filter to take advantage of Alfred 5.5 caching. Apart from minor updates to the ReadMe there are no other material changes so if you are using a version of Alfred earlier than 5.5 please stay on version 1.3 of the workflow. Stephen

The workflow has been updated to version 2.5. It has been re-written as a script filter to take advantage of Alfred 5.5 caching. Alfred now also learns from used items to bring them to the top of the list. The ReadMe is updated, Transfer & Reset was removed as it was not accessible. I have added access to the Software Update panel and Keyboard Shortcuts. Do note that version 2.5 requires Alfred 5.5 and later. If you are on an earlier version of Alfred please use version 2.0 of the workflow. As the workflow is on the Alfred Gallery you should be able to update from there within a few days. Stephen

I don't believe it has anything at all to do with stage manager (although I have to confess that I never use it). You simply need to ensure that Alfred keeps open the relevant windows when running the workflow. See this Alfred help page for some explanation about alternative actions and keeping open the Alfred window (although, as you've seen, it's not simply to prevent "the Alfred window from flickering”). Stephen

Welcome to the forum. I suggest you run your workflow and post the complete output from the debugger (not just a small section of it)—because that will make it much easier to analyse exactly what is happening. There is no inherent problem with Alfred 5.5 beta accepting multiple sequential inputs from keyword prompts. At least one of my workflows does that it works perfectly using Alfred 5.5 beta (1, 2 and RC). It may also be helpful to confirm what version of macOS you are using. Stephen

Andrew, of course it's working exactly as intended. 😀 Stephen

Yes, it's a little tricky until you become aware of it. Stephen

Welcome to the forum. You mean like Alfred Preferences → Appearance, Options (at the bottom of the second column) and then Show Alfred on…? 😃 Stephen

This Alfred help page states: The second certainly works for me but I'm not sure that the first does. When I edit a script filter that includes caching I still need to click Flush in the debugger in order to see the changes. It may be a misunderstanding on my part as to what constitutes "Editing”—but I've certainly made additions to or deletions from the script filter when I'm not seeing the changes, when running the filter, without clicking Flush. Edit: I wonder whether it's because the script I'm editing is in the workflow folder. 🤔 Stephen

Perfect: thanks Vitor. I tried just about every variation I could imagine but not, of course, that one. Stephen

I have a script filter with a tediously long list of items which displays in Alfred in a /bin/zsh --no-rcs window like this: cat <<EOF { "items": [ { blah blah blah }, …… { blah blah blah } ] } EOF I need to cache that list using the new Alfred 5.5 utility but much fruitless experimentation has yet to show me how and where to do it. In essence, where and how do you use that cache utility in this context? Stephen (yet again revealing ignorance of a language to which he is allergic)

A reboot sometimes solves problems like that. Stephen

As I understand it, the Tab keys works to autocomplete the names of files and applications Alfred's window: see Alfred Cheatsheet. Stephen

Ah, you clearly have not seen news of the Alfred 5.5 beta. Stephen

@macrospect I've had a little more time to look at this and I think you'll find Pearcen's workflow will do exactly what you want because it does exactly what I mentioned in my previous post and is much more elegant than my earlier programming solution. Stephen

See also today's pertinent article by Howard Oakley. Stephen

Not with my workflow as currently written, sorry. Stephen

@macrospect I've not had a chance to look at @Pearcen's workflow but if by any chance it doesn't do what you want I should be able easily to recreate and post a link to my workflow. However it should also (as Pearcen implies) be possible simply to replace a space with a hyphen without using code and making use of Alfred's Replace utility. You could easily create a Universal Action (limited to text) to work that magic on appropriate selected text. Stephen

This is purely a guess as I do not use iCloud Drive, but are either of you using Optimise Mac Storage? If so I think Alfred will be unable to find the relevant files whatever you do. In other words, in order for Alfred to find them you'd probably have to disable Optimise Mac Storage and add iCloud Drive to your Alfred search scope (or, much better, create a specific File Filter to search for files on iCloud Drive). However, as I say, I do not use iCloud Drive so can't guarantee that what I have suggested would work: sorry! The best way to approach the issue, I think, is to create a specific file filter designed to search iCloud Drive and see if you can make that work. That way you won't either or mess up your default Alfred search scope or clutter your normal searches with unwanted results. Stephen

I've looked at your workflow but I still don't understand why you want to try to do that. The idea of a Universal Actions is that it works—using your Universal Action hotkey—on a selected item (i.e., text, a fle or a URL). All you need to do is to have a number of Universal Actions within your workflow—each limited to either file, text or URL and labelled appropriately. That means you'll end up with something like that following Universal Actions within the workflow: Send text… Send a URL… Send a file… Share text… Share a URL… Share a file… Then all you would have to do would be to select something, use your Universal Action hotkey and start typing either "send…” or "share…” to see your relevant Universal Action. Alfred will then take care, for you, to select the relevant action (i.e., on text, a URL or a file). To emphasise the point, you need a Universal Action for each type of object (file, URL or text) and for each action (send or share). At the moment you have Universal Actions which apply to both text and a URL (although possibly in your case it won't make a difference to the recipient if you send a URL as simply text). Stephen

Version 2.0 is on the Alfred Gallery now. Stephen

That is because you passed in a string to that Automation Task and it correctly rejects it because it is not a file. If you test the output of the Automation Task in a Conditional true/false test you can filter the input accordingly. In other words what I originally suggested will work: you just have to test the output from the Automation Task in a Conditional in your workflow. Frankly, the easiest way to distinguish between files, strings and URLs is to use Universal Actions and set up a different action for each type. Stephen

I'd be inclined to try this: pass the input to the "Is File?” Automation Task and if the resuilt is true deal with the file; if the result is false pass the input to a Conditional and use regex to check whether the string starts with "http”. That deals with files and URLs and otherwise (I think!) leaves you with a string. Do you think that might work for you? Stephen

It looks to me as though you have copied the filename from Finder. Try opening the image and copying the image itself and you should see the preview. Stephen

To be quite clear, the latest version is Alfred 5.5. beta 2. Do you mean that or Alfred 5.1.4 which was the prior release version? (It's always better to be specific about version numbers rather than simply refer to "the latest version” because, in cases like this it's important and can lead to confusion.) Stephen

Have you made sure your preferences are made available offline? Stephen