Alfred workflows that I can't live without
Alfred is my favourite productivity app for macOS. You can use the basic features for free, but it shines the most with the Powerpack. I use it literally hundreds of times a day. The basic app launcher, file browser, web search, clipboard history, and more advanced workflows.
During pair programming sessions with my colleagues, I often hear the question “how did you do XYZ?” and most often, the answer is “Alfred”. So today, I would like to show you some of the most helpful custom workflows that I use all the time. Enjoy!
- Div — windows manager
- GitHub Search
- MDN Search
- npm Search
- SShot — change the screenshot format in no time
- JSON parse/stringify
- Text manipulations
- Theme - toggle between ligh/dark mode
- CoinMarketCap — currencies converter
- Docs
Div — windows manager
There is plenty of good windows managers for macOS, but with a little bit of AppleScript, you can create your own one, so I did. Div is crazy powerful in its simplicity. It comes with few layouts predefined, but you can always add your own presets and attach them to your preferable keybindings. “Div — a simple Alfred window manager” goes more in-depth about the feature set and implementation details.
GitHub Search
Using GitHub Search workflow, I can browse GitHub repositories in no time. The Return click redirects to the project’s website, but alternatively, you can go straight to open issues and pull requests by holding the modifiers key (Cmd and Option).
MDN Search
Inspired by “How MDN’s autocomplete search works” by Peter Bengtsson, I recently created MDN Search workflow. It is blazingly fast as it does not perform any external network calls under the hood. The documentation mapping is stored locally in the workflow.
npm Search
Same idea but for npm. Under the hood, this workflow uses Skypack API because it is faster and provides more valuable info (TypeScript support, for example).
SShot — change the screenshot format in no time
Changing the screenshot format on macOS requires some Terminal commands that I used to google all the time. So, I created SShot workflow to perform this action using a single ss Alfred command.
JSON parse/stringify
Browsing tons of logs every day, it’s common to come across some stringified piece of JSON data. Sure, I can go to the browser’s console and do a bit of copy(JSON.parse()) magic, but I created Alfred JSON workflow workflow to speed the process up.
Text manipulations
This one is super simple and I use it all the time. If you fancy adding some other text manipulations to the Text manipulation workflow, I am open to suggestions. Pull requests are always welcome.
Theme - toggle between light/dark mode
Switch between system appearance mode using theme keyword or alternatively using Ctrl + Option + D hotkey. You can download Alfred Theme from on my GitHub account.
CoinMarketCap — currencies converter
From time to time, I need to convert some cryptocurrencies to regular fiat, and most of the time, I use CoinMarketCap for that. So, I built CoinMarketCap Alfred workflow to do it without ever opening a web browser. I shared more details about this workflow in “I built a thing - an Alfred workflow for CoinMarketCap conversions” post.
Docs
This one is a dead simple and I use it all the time! Docs workflow redirects you to docs of your favourite projects with only a few keystrokes.
Where can I find the Theme Workflow?
Chris Messina, the hashtag dude?! Wow! Thanks for visiting my blog! My bad, I missed a link to Alfred Theme workflow but you can find it on my GitHub.
Hey brother :D Do I need Deno installed on my macbook to make the Github flow work? I'm getting an error when trying to use it.
Siema Maciej. Yes, I recently refactored them all to use deno runtime instead of Node.js. Sorry about that. Quick
brew install denoshould do, but if you are not big fan of, refactor that back to Node.js shouldn't take longer than few minutes.