Keeping core documents on-hand

One of the challenges of being able to communicate consistently and constantly is having the right documents on hand. When spread across multiple projects or teams, you’ll find these documents may be in multiple locations - but if they have a local sync capability (like OneDrive + Sharepoint) you can create your own personal briefcase of priority files to have on hand.

Yes, I know OneDrive apps offer a pinned/favorite option for files - but they’re separated by app. I usually have Word docs, PowerPoint files, etc all mixed together and this has been the best solution for that challenge.

Overall setup

You designate a local folder, like ~/Documents/CoreDocuments, to be your go-to directory for the files you need frequently. I like to keep this folder pinned to the dock in folder display mode for 1-second access, but you can also make it easy to get to by dragging it into the Favorites in Finder.

From here, we’ll be placing Aliases in the folder to the files we use frequently. You can manually create these for each file by selecting “Make Alias” from the context menu and then dragging the newly created alias into the your CoreDocuments directory (or whatever you’re calling it). This is still a win in terms of having better access to files, but since the destination will always be the same - it seems silly to always have a 2nd step.

Enter Shortcuts, Applescript, and the Quick Actions menu.

Leveraging Shortcuts

Open the Shortcuts app on your computer - a powerhouse of a utility for creating automations. This is the 2-step shortcut we’re going to create:

1. Start a new shortcut and using the info icon on the right, select “Use as Quick Action” and “Finder”.

2. In the 1st step of the shortcut, change the “Receive” option to select only Files

3. Using the cascading squares icon on the right, find “Run AppleScript” and double-click to bring it onto the canvas.

4. Click on the “Run AppleScript” step where “Shortcut Input” is linked and change the type dropdown to File.

5. In the body of the AppleScript step, paste in the AppleScript snippet provided below. Modify the 2nd line to match the path to the folder you created to store your aliases in.

6. Click on the header of the window to rename the shortcut and optionally change the icon up.

That’s it. Close the window, and get ready to test it (details below the AppleScript).

the AppleScript

on run {input, parameters}
    set destPath to "/Users/drewsk/Documents/CoreDocuments"
    set destFolderAlias to POSIX file destPath

    tell application "Finder"
        set destFolder to folder destFolderAlias

        repeat with anItem in input
            make new alias file at destFolder to anItem
        end repeat
    end tell

    return input
end run

The shortcut in action

Using the context menu on any file (or selecting multiple), under the “Quick Actions” branch your shortcut will now appear. Selecting it makes an alias immediately in your designated folder, making it much easier to get back to this file multiple times in the future.

Helpful links

It took just a bit for me to get this working how I wanted, and this article was helpful in working with the raw AppleScript before moving into Shortcuts:

https://www.codegenes.net/blog/how-do-i-create-a-macintosh-finder-alias-from-the-command-line/