Have I ever talked about how a lot I really like shortcuts?
All proper, possibly I’ve. (Perhaps, erm, someplace within the neighborhood of seven,942 occasions, come to think about it.) However oh, it’s true. There’s simply one thing so impossibly satisfying about realizing you are rising your effectivity and slicing soul-sucking seconds out of your day.
And on Android, whoo boy, have we acquired some superior alternatives for reducing out steps and reaching Mega-Nerd™ ranges of effectivity obsession.
At this time, as your pleasant neighborhood Mega-Nerd™, I need to remind you about an simply neglected possibility for including some further step-shaving shortcuts straight onto your private home display. These shortcuts are buried deep inside a few of Android’s most productivity-oriented apps. And also you’d should be — properly, an efficiency-obsessed Mega-Nerd™ to even understand they’re there.
My pal, put together to attain Mega-Nerd™ standing.
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Android’s out-of-sight shortcut sorcery
So, here is what’s particularly fascinating in regards to the Android shortcuts of which we communicate: They’re nearly equivalent in type to the usual Android App Shortcuts system — y’know, that factor the place you may press and maintain any app’s icon on your private home display to disclose a collection of direct hyperlinks to particular features inside the app — solely with these, you actually should exit of your approach to discover ’em.
These commonplace Android App Shortcuts are spectacular and equally all too simple to neglect about. (I’ve acquired a primer and a bunch of particular solutions right here, if you happen to might do with a refresher.) However the ones we’re speaking about right now are much more mysterious.
With particular Android apps, y’see, you may create your personal customized shortcuts to particular person objects throughout the app from contained in the app itself.
Which may be probably the most complicated sentence I’ve ever written, I understand. But it surely’s a troublesome idea to convey with out simply strolling by way of a real-world instance — so let’s try this, we could?
This chance tends to be current in productiveness apps the place you are coping with a number of particular person paperwork, information, or different such objects. So for our first instance, let’s begin with Google Drive.
Open up the Drive app on Android and discover any file and even folder that you simply have a tendency to drag up usually out of your telephone. Faucet the little three-dot menu icon alongside it, and look intently on the sprawling record of choices that seems in entrance of your blinking peepers.
Halfway down that record — and also you may even should scroll a little bit to see it, relying on the dimensions of your system — you must see an innocuous little possibility known as “Add to house display.”
JR
Faucet that son of a gibbon, and the way ’bout that? You’ll be able to really add a one-tap shortcut to that precise merchandise proper onto your private home display for super-speedy, direct entry. Which means you may get to it simply, anytime, with out ever having to open up the primary Drive app or do any method of digging.
JR
What’s fascinating is that these identical kinds of shortcuts will generally present up once you press and maintain the related app’s icon, however as a rule, they will not. That space of the Android interface tends to incorporate a mixture of features inside an app together with one or two not too long ago accessed objects. However when there is a particular file or folder you are eyeing, it is as much as you to dive into the precise app and discover it — then discover the choice so as to add it onto your private home display from there.
And Drive is not the one place the place this puzzling chance exists.
Shortcuts, shortcuts, in every single place
Bear in mind how I stated it is principally productiveness apps the place this method comes up? Perhaps it will not shock you, then, that one other Android app that is an ideal place to discover it’s Google Docs.
Open up Docs, faucet the three-dot menu icon subsequent to any doc you have acquired, and hunt for the “Add to house display” possibility within the panel that seems. (Right here specifically, you may nearly definitely should scroll down a little bit to seek out it. Advised ya it was hidden!)
Faucet that sucker, and shazam: You’ve got now acquired a one-tap shortcut that’ll beam you on to that particular doc — proper from your private home display.
JR
Does not get a lot simpler than that. And the identical factor is feasible in Microsoft Phrase on Android, too, by the way in which, if that is your jam.
The idea applies to the spreadsheet entrance as properly, like within the Google Sheets Android app:
JR
And it is obtainable throughout the Google Contacts Android app, too. Simply open up any particular person contact there, then faucet the three-dot menu icon within the upper-right nook of the display to offer your self a fast ‘n’ easy hyperlink to that particular Homo sapien’s hub.
Probably the most outstanding instance — although one which’s nonetheless super-easy to miss and/or neglect about — is Chrome. There, you may faucet the three-dot menu icon whereas viewing any particular website so as to add a direct hyperlink to that website onto your private home display.
And there is yet one more aspect of this method price contemplating.
Wait — widgets?!
What’s particularly complicated about this setup is that the types of shortcuts we’re speaking about are technically thought-about Android widgets — although in actuality, they actually aren’t. They’re shortcuts.
This is how I do know: Widgets cannot be stacked. Attempt to drag one widget on high of one other, and nothing will occur (apart from discovering your self feeling barely foolish for a second).
With these app-added shortcuts, in distinction, you may drag and stack to your coronary heart’s content material. And, in truth, that opens up one other fascinating chance: You’ll be able to create folders of associated shortcuts to offer your self a customized productiveness command middle.
JR
That widget miscategorization is essential to bear in mind, although, ‘trigger you may sometimes encounter a shortcut like this that may solely be accessed by way of your telephone’s widget-adding menu — not by way of the app itself.
That is the case with Gmail, as an example. Press and maintain your finger wherever on your private home display and discover the widget-adding possibility, then discover Gmail within the record and search for the “Gmail label” merchandise. That’ll allow you to add a one-tap shortcut to any particular label out of your inbox on your private home display, and similar to the opposite shortcuts we have been constructing, that shortcut can then be mixed with any others right into a folder for maximal group.
The identical is true with Microsoft’s OneDrive app for Android in addition to the Google Maps Android app — which gives up the choice to make a one-tap hyperlink for opening up instructions to any particular vacation spot. You simply should look in that widget-adding menu to seek out it.
So use the examples we simply went over as a place to begin after which poke round to see what else you could find. One factor’s for positive: You’ve got acquired some superior choices for further effectivity at your fingertips. And now that you’ve this Mega-Nerd™ data in your noggin, you realize precisely methods to uncover ’em and profit from their potential.