A Soulver Shortcut and Drafts Action

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I recently noticed that Toolbox Pro had a Calculate with Soulver Shortcuts action, which allows text to be run through the engine that powers the Soulver app. Even better, it’s the version of the engine from Soulver 3, which is currently Mac only, although an iOS version is on the way.

I made a shortcut which makes use of this Toolbox Pro action in Shortcuts to do quick calculations in natural language. It can be run either as a standalone shortcut, in which case it prompts for input, or via a companion action in Drafts. I like having the Drafts option available because I’m used to opening Drafts to jot things down. Using it as a quick calculation scratchpad also feels quite natural. Multiple calculations can be entered on separate lines, and the result for each is appended after an equals sign on the same line. It’s not as powerful as Soulver 3 for iOS will be, but for now it’s useful to have around.

Source: PolyMaths

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I tried using the standalone shortcut and it says it requires an app to be installed. I have Soulver on my Mac. I am running your shortcut on my iPad. Which app do I require, I don’t have any version of Soulver on my iPad?

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It requires ToolBox Pro.

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Even the standalone shortcut? If I download toolbox pro, where does the output get pasted? And can it sync with my Mac Soulver sheet? I’ll try toolbox pro, thanks

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Yes, it’s the Shortcuts app that’s actually doing the work. If you’re using the shortcut on its own, the output is just shown in a temporary banner at the top. You could easily change it to copy the result to the clipboard if that is what you would prefer. Let me know if you need help with that.

Unfortunately this is iOS only, because there’s no Shortcuts app on the Mac, although since Soulver itself is on the Mac it’s less of an issue. Think of this as a very basic substitute for Soulver on iOS.