As I mentioned last week in the MacStories Weekly newsletter and have been hinting recently on both Connected and AppStories, I’m in the process of building a “perfect memory” system in Obsidian that allows me to save, archive, and search anything I write, think about, or come across on the Internet. This project is a...
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Time for Calendars
Federico
JohnThis week, Federico and John survey their favorite calendar apps, discussing the strengths and weaknesses of each.
On AppStories+, Federico shares Shortcuts tips for working with Google’s Gemini API and the highly structured data it returns. Plus he and John share their concern and cautious optimism for the future of Shortcuts.
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Links and Show Notes
Calendar Apps
- Calendar Apps
- Apple Calendar
- Raycast Calendar Integration
- BusyCal
- Mac App Store
- iOS and iPadOS App Store
- Setapp
- Read more in Club MacStories Weekly
- Dato
- Fantastical
- Week Number
- Notion Calendar
- Timepage
- Week Calendar
- Agenda
- Calendar 366 II
- Structured
- FirstSeed Calendar
- minical
- Also Mentioned:
- Todoist
- Shortwave
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My Obsidian Setup, Part 12: Rethinking YouTube Watch Later with Markdown and AI
Earlier this week on the Connected Pro pre-show, I mentioned that I’ve decided to take on the challenge of building a “perfect memory” for myself in Obsidian. The project involves three key aspects: Saving all kinds of content into Obsidian: my articles, transcribed voice recordings, but also videos I watch online and interesting webpages I...
Return of the Utility Grab Bag
This week, Federico and John share some of their favorite utility apps, including Amphetamine, Text Lens, Gifski, Folder Peek, Mic Drop, Keka, and Marked.
Then, on AppStories+, Federico and John extend their conversation about utilities with six more favorites.
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AppStories Episode 430 - Return of the Utility Grab Bag
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30:37
30:37
This episode is sponsored by:
- Rogue Amoeba: makers of incredibly useful audio tools for your Mac. Use the code
MS2504through the end of April to get 20% off Rogue Amoeba’s apps.
Links and Show Notes
Follow Up
- BarCuts issues fixed
- Zen Browser
Our Favorite Utilities
- John
- Amphetamine
- Gifski
- Mic Drop
- Also mentioned: Week Number
- Federico
- Text Lens
- Also mentioned: Text Sniper and CleanShot X
- Folder Peek
- Keka
- Text Lens
- Joint Pick
Menu Bar Tangent
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Transcriber: A Shortcut to Generate YouTube Video Transcripts
As I teased yesterday in my story about processing video transcripts on the Mac using Simon Willison’s llm CLI, I wanted to write about the shortcut that actually generates those raw video transcripts. Today, I’m happy to share Transcriber, a shortcut that takes any YouTube video URL, extracts its content, and saves a full transcript...
Using Simon Willison’s LLM CLI to Process YouTube Transcripts in Shortcuts with Claude and Gemini
I’ve been experimenting with different automations and command line utilities to handle audio and video transcripts lately. In particular, I’ve been working with Simon Willison’s LLM command line utility as a way to interact with cloud-based large language models (primarily Claude and Gemini) directly from the macOS terminal.
For those unfamiliar, Willison’s LLM CLI tool is a command line utility that lets you communicate with services like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude using shell commands and dedicated plugins. The llm command is extremely flexible when it comes to input and output; it supports multiple modalities like audio and video attachments for certain models, and it offers custom schemas to return structured output from an API. Even for someone like me – not exactly a Terminal power user – the different llm commands and options are easy to understand and tweak.
Today, I want to share a shortcut I created on my Mac that takes long transcripts of YouTube videos and:
- reformats them for clarity with proper paragraphs and punctuation, without altering the original text,
- extracts key points and highlights from the transcript, and
- organizes highlights by theme or idea.
I created this shortcut because I wanted a better system for linking to YouTube videos, along with interesting passages from them, on MacStories. Initially, I thought I could use an app I recently mentioned on AppStories and Connected to handle this sort of task: AI Actions by Sindre Sorhus. However, when I started experimenting with long transcripts (such as this one with 8,000 words from Theo about Electron), I immediately ran into limitations with native Shortcuts actions. Those actions were running out of memory and randomly stopping the shortcut.
I figured that invoking a shell script using macOS’ built-in ‘Run Shell Script’ action would be more reliable. Typically, Apple’s built-in system actions (especially on macOS) aren’t bound to the same memory constraints as third-party ones. My early tests indicated that I was right, which is why I decided to build the shortcut around Willison’s llm tool.
Pick 3: Automations
This week, Federico and John take listeners on a tour of the wide variety of automations they’ve been working on so far this year, including shortcuts, Claude projects, and Zapier zaps.
On AppStories+, Federico and John dig a little deeper into some of the more complex automations that they’ve been working on in 2025.
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This episode is sponsored by:
- BetterTouchTool – Get ready for BTT Mobile. Visit the BetterTouchTool community to learn more.
- Notion – Try the powerful, easy-to-use Notion AI today.
Links and Show Notes
Pick 3: Our Latest Automations
- Federico’s Audio Transcription Automation
- John’s Fetch Podcast Details Shortcut
- Federico on Using AI Actions with Newer AI Models
- Unread’s Shortcuts Integration
- Federico’s Use of a Simple API for Transcribing of YouTube Videos
- John’s Podcast Clips Claude Project
- Also mentioned
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Automating Shortcuts’ Tedious Permission Prompts
As I covered on Connected earlier this week, I’ve been playing around with a Mac mini server for the past month for a variety of tasks. Besides running local LLM tasks on it (such as transcribing videos or podcasts), processing audio files with shell commands, and experimenting with Cursor, I’ve found it nice to have...
From Dashboard Widgets to Breaking News: Mark Gurman’s Path to Bloomberg
In this special interview episode, Federico and John welcome Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman to discuss his 16-year journey covering Apple. Mark shares how he started as a teenage app developer before joining 9to5Mac and eventually Bloomberg. The conversation explores Mark’s most memorable scoops, the evolution of Apple news coverage, his relationship with Apple, and advice for aspiring tech journalists.
On AppStories+, Federico and John get into the weeds to explore the hardware and apps Mark Gurman uses and discuss Apple’s acquisition of Pixelmator.
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AppStories Episode 428 - From Dashboard Widgets to Breaking News: Mark Gurman’s Path to Bloomberg
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46:54
46:54
This episode is sponsored by:
- Memberful – Easy-to-Use Reliable Membership Software
- Drafts – Where text starts. New and expired subscribers can use the link to get your first year of Drafts for $9.99.
- Tripsy – Your Travel Toolkit. Use the link for 25% off a lifetime purchase or 30% off a 1-Year subscription.
Links and Show Notes
An Interview with Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman
- Dashcode
- Mark Gurman’s writing at Bloomberg
- Mark Gurman’s Power On newsletter
- Stories and topics covered: