Create custom shortcuts to anything on Android with Shortcut Customizer
Shortcut Customizer is a free application for Android that you can make use of to create shortcuts to several different types of data to speed things up while using the device.
Apart from creating shortcuts to applications, it lets you create shortcuts that point to bookmarks, email address, phones numbers, music or other data that is available on the handheld or tablet that you are using.
You can use the app to create mail or phone shortcuts for instance, so that you can write emails or call someone with a tap on the icon instead of having to open associated applications first.
The same is true for media shortcuts which allow you to play music or movies with a tap, or view an image in the default image viewer.
There is also a custom option that you can use to create shortcuts to types not directly supported by Shortcut Customizer including downloads and other files.
The creation of new shortcuts is simple.
- Open Shortcut Customizer on your Android device.
- The app displays a list of available shortcut types on start.
- Select the type you want to create. Depending on the selected type, it may take you to the file browser, display bookmarks, phone numbers or a list of contacts.
- It opens the configuration page on the next screen once you have made a selection.
- There you can change the name of the shortcut and depending on type the color of the icon.
All shortcuts that you create are placed on one of the phone's or tablet's home screens. You can move, merge or delete them from there just like any other icon on Android.
The application has a few caveats that I'd like to mention. First, it displays ads on the icon customization screen and sometimes also full screen. Second, you may not change icons for select types but only their color. If you create a bookmark shortcut for instance, you may only change its title and icon color but not the icon itself (which is generic). It would have made sense to use the site's favicon or let users pick a custom icon for the site.
Closing Words
Shortcut Customizer is a useful application for a number of use cases. You can use it to quickly dial a phone number or open a website among other things. It could do with additional customization options especially in regards to selecting custom icons for types where this is currently not supported.
Please note that shortcuts get removed when you uninstall the application and that you may pin some information directly without using third-party software.
Thanks for the tip Martin.
It is for these kinds of posts that I follow GHacks.
What’s up with the generic comment, are you a bot?
2G?
Where on the planet is that still in use? I was forced to give up using my RAZRV3 years ago because 2G was phased out by AT&T.
Everywhere 3G has been turned off and you don’t have LTE coverage, and believe me there are many developed countries where this is the case and if it weren’t for 2G you wouldn’t even be able to make a phone call.
Maybe I missed it, but I don’t believe tha term “2G” is in the article. Perhaps you are referring to “AGM G2”??
@Martin
Your website has gone insane.
When I the post button I then saw my comment posted on a different article page. When I opened this article again, it is here.
@Tachy @Martin Brinkmann
” Your website has gone insane. ”
Same here. Has happened several times.
@Tachy,
@Martin P.,
For over two weeks now,
I’ve been seeing “Comments” posted by subscribers appearing in different, unrelated articles.
https://www.ghacks.net/windows-11-update-stuck-fixed-for-good/#comment-4572991
https://www.ghacks.net/windows-11-update-stuck-fixed-for-good/#comment-4572951
For the time being,
it would be better to specify the “article name and URL” at the beginning of the post.
@tachy a lot of non-phone devices with a sim in them rely on 2G, at least here in europe.
Usually things reporting usage or errors/alarms on something remote that does not get day to day inspection in person. They are out there in vast numbers doing important work. Reliable, good range. The low datarate is no problem at all in those cases.
3G is gone or on its last legs everywhere, but this stuff still has too much use to cancel.
Anyhow, interesting that they would put that in. I can see the point if you suspect a hostile 2G environment (amateur eavesdroppers with laptop, ranging up to professional grade MITM fake towers while “strangely” not getting the stronger crypto voip 4G because it is being jammed, and back down to something as old ‘stingray’ devices fallen into the wrong hands).
But does this also mean that they have handled and rolled out a fix for that nasty 4G ‘pwn by broadcast’ problem you reported earlier this year? I had 4G disabled due to that, on the off chance that some of the local criminals would buy some cheap chinese gear, download a working exploit and probe every phone in range all over town in the hope of getting into phones of the police.
>”While most may never be attacked in stingrays, it is still recommended to disable 2G cellular connections, especially since it does not have any downsides.”
The downside would be losing connectivity. I spend a lot of time way out in the countryside where there’s often no service or almost none. My network allows 2G, and I need it sometimes. I have an option on the phone to disable 2G, I may do that when I’m in the city and I have good 5G connectivity, but not out in the country.
I would imagine that the stingray exploits, like most of the bad things in this world, are probably things you will run into in the crowded big cities.
I stopped using it in a mobile (Wi-Fi line) environment, so I’m almost ignorant of the actual situation,
But the recent reality in Japan makes me realize that “the infrastructure of the web is nothing more than a papier-mâché fiction”.
https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/17/google-chrome-to-enable-https-first-by-default-for-all-users/#comment-4572402
It is already beyond the scope of what an individual can do.
What we should be aware of is the reality that “governments and those in power want to control the world through the Web”, and efforts to counter (resist and prevent) such ambitions are necessary.
Why do you want people to disable the privacy features? Hmmmmm?
Now You: do you plan to keep the Ads privacy features enabled?
I’d like to tell you, but apparently if you make a post critical of Google, you get censored. * [Editor: removed, just try to bring your opinion across without attacking anyone]
@Martin
You website is still psychotic. Comments attach to random stories.
@Martin please do fix the comments, it’s completely insane commenting here! :[
@Martin
The comments are seriously messed up on gHacks now. These comments are mixed with the article at the below URL.
https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/18/android-how-to-disable-2g-cellular-connections-to-improve-security/
And comments on other articles are from as far back as 2010.
What does this article has anything to do with all the comments on this article? LOL I think this Websuite is ran by ChatGPT. every article is messed up. Some older comments from 2015 shown up in recant articles, LOL
The picture captioned “Clearing the Android Auto’s cache might resolve the issue” is from Apple Carplay ;)
How about other things that matter:
Drop survival?
Screen toughness?
Degree of water and dust protection?