As I’ve been diving deeper and deeper into the Shortcuts rabbit hole on iOS, there’s one thing that I’ve been wanting to play around with that I haven’t had a chance to: NFC triggers for automation.
Recently, I was thinking about setting one up to launch Nudget, my budgeting app of choice, when I bring my debit card to my phone’s NFC reader (at the suggestion of master automator, Rosemary Orchard) but I didn’t really have a need for that. I’ve been using Apple Pay most of the time when I’m out, and when I don’t, my Log Expenses shortcut does exactly what I need it to, even from my Apple Watch.
That left me with nothing to try.
Nintendo & Chill
Enter the 30th anniversary 8-bit Super Mario Amiibo that was released a few years back. While I was driving home from work the other day, I had a thought.
I really enjoy the “… & Chill series of albums that GameChops puts out. I tend to use them when I’m trying to do focused work, though I also like to have them on in the background when I’m relaxing. And that’s where it all came together.
I had the realization that I could use that special Mario Amiibo to trigger a Nintendo & Chill automation. Here’s what I came up with:
Once I tap the Amiibo to the top of my phone, the playback source is set to my HomePod mini, the songs are pulled from the Nintendo & Chill playlist, and are then shuffled.
For a bit of added fun, I also built a simple reset playback shortcut (not triggered by NFC) that pauses the music and sets playback back to my iPhone.
What are some fun NFC automations you’ve come up with for Shortcuts? I’d love to hear about them in the comments below!
Dan Stransky 