Alfred Remote automates work with Mac through iOS devices

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

Every year Apple is gradually expanding the functionality of Spotlight, an integrated search engine in OS X. In the latest OS X Yosemite, the search engine has acquired several interesting features that have pleased Apple users. However, some of these features are regionally blocked (for example, working with Maps), which greatly upsets many. In this regard, some users preferred to replace the standard search engine with no less interesting and more functional solutions. Among the most popular is the one that can now be controlled even from iOS devices by downloading a separate Alfred Remote application.

At its core, Alfred for OS X is not so much a standalone full-fledged replacement for Spotlight, but a platform on the basis of which community users create their own “workflows” to perform certain tasks using this application. Automator for OS X has a similar concept, with which you can implement solutions to various routine processes for the convenience of working with the system or facilitating similar tasks.

By installing Alfred (free), we get a similar platform, but this will not be enough for solving our own problems. To download processes created by the community or your own, you must additionally purchase Powerpack, which will allow these same processes to be created and integrated into yourself. There are a lot of implementations of absolutely different tasks, their examples are available in the official community - add and use.

The Alfred Remote application works roughly the same way. This is also a kind of platform into which you can integrate your processes for interaction with desktop OS X using a mobile device. However, due to the specifics of iOS, they cannot be loaded directly into Alfred Remote, this is done through a client for the desktop system. In the new version of Alfred 2, the Remote tab has finally become available in the application settings. Through it we add devices on which Alfred Remote is installed and manage the settings of the mobile application.

On the left side of Alfred 2, menu categories are displayed - exactly the same ones that will be available in the mobile application. By default, they are divided into five categories, but if you wish, you can create new ones for yourself.

A simple example of implementing some of the features:

The first category contains icons for various actions that are responsible for system-related processes, including launching a screensaver, shutting down / restarting a computer, emptying the recycle bin, and others. After launching the mobile application, it will automatically connect to your Mac. Now clicking on the corresponding icon in Alfred Remote will launch the process intended for it on OS X. That is, if you click on the empty trash icon in an iOS application, the trash itself will be emptied on OS X, and so on, by analogy.

Naturally, you are free to change the location of processes, delete, and add new ones. One click on an empty field - and you will see a context menu where you can add the command you are interested in. For example, you can expose iTunes control buttons to control a desktop client through a mobile application.

In addition to various processes, you can set commands to open specific applications, files and folders, run Terminal commands, AppleScripts, run a search or specific links to a site. The possibilities are really vast. And, as you can imagine, this is just the beginning, because community developers will soon catch up and expand Alfred's functionality even more. At the time of this writing, the first extensions have already appeared on the official forum.

Now a little about the nuances. First, Alfred Remote connects to your computer only when they are both on the same Wi-Fi network. I hope that this limitation will be removed in the next versions and the application will learn to work via bluetooth as well. The second, so far not entirely clear question: "What is the scope of this application?"It seems that we can open folders, launch applications and individual settings with OS X, because in any case we will have to interact with them while sitting at the computer. And we can switch tracks in iTunes and flip through presentation slides without Alfred. Here all the hope is in the community, which, I hope, will offer interesting implementations of work between applications. And the last thing is, as always, the price. 279 rubles is quite a lot for an ordinary user who does not get as much at his disposal as he would like.

But, be that as it may, Alfred Remote is a very interesting extension of the application's functionality for OS X. I am sure that the community will be able to come up with and implement many interesting use cases for the two Alfreds. You just need to wait a little.

What do you use? Standard Spotlight or third-party development? How do you like the idea of Alfred Remote? Share your opinion in the comments!