![]() iOS sandboxing would limit what a third-party app could do, but Apple could enable these kinds of automations natively in iOS. It can, for example, open an app, toggle settings, even send messages. There’s also an Android app called Tasker which is pretty much an IFTTT app for triggering bespoke actions when your phone connects to your home Wi-Fi. That can do things like automatically switch your phone ringer from a loud ring (which might be needed on the street) to vibrate (more home-friendly) when it detects you are home. It would also be useful to borrow a few features from some Android devices, like the Pixel. For most people, that is going to be within sight of their front door. It’s frustrating because there is a much more reliable option available: triggering presence detection when we connect to our home’s Wi-Fi network. Since we live on the 18th floor, and it can take a couple of minutes to get from the lobby, through the security doors, and up the elevator, that makes it unsafe to use presence detection to do things like unlock the front door. There’s then an additional complication for those of us who live in apartment blocks …Įven 100% reliable location detection will trigger when we reach the building lobby, not when we’re at our door. GPS location can be less than 100% reliable in cities anyway, as signals are either blocked by tall buildings or bounce off them. This adds the new toggle shortcut to your home screen, and it should now work like this:Ī simple click to toggle the VPN connection.I’ve noted before that HomeKit presence detection is extremely unreliable for me, relying as it does on Location Services. To add it to your home screen, tap on “ Add” in the top right hand corner. ![]() This brings up a preview of the icon selected and name for the Shortcut. Tap the arrow besides your shortcut name again and select “ Add to Home Screen”. Tap on VPN to select which connection you want to use. Change this by tapping on “ Connect” and change it to “ Toggle”. In this case, I wanted a toggle switch to either connect or disconnect a VPN connection. ![]() Tap on “ Add Action” and search for “ Set VPN”īy default the action for the Shortcut is “Connect”, which will connect to a VPN. Tap the arrow besides “New Shortcut", and select Rename and put in whatever you want to call it. Open the Shortcuts app and tap the “ +” button in the upper-right corner. How to configure a VPN Toggle button on iOS # I have tested this for both “native” L2TP VPN connections, and Wireguard connections. Luckily iOS Shortcuts provide a way of doing that, which works very well. Toggle VPN connection Shortcut Button or Widget #įor some reason iOS does not provide a native VPN widget, or a way of quickly toggling a VPN connection without navigating into settings. Now, I am pretty sure I have looked into how to do this years ago, without finding a solution, but in case someone else might benefit from it, here is a walkthrough of creating a simple VPN toggle button on your iOS homescreen, i.e no more diving into settings to connect. ![]() For me, the use case was simplifying connecting to my home, or work lab, network, via VPN. I have probably been living under a rock for quite some time, but it turns out iOS Shortcuts (and MacOS) are pretty awesome, once you identify a proper use case for them.
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