Comment by chazeon

Comment by chazeon 3 days ago

19 replies

You can actually directly scan in the Files app from the triple dots menu in the upper right corner, this will allow you to directly scan as a PDF file.

toomuchtodo 2 days ago

I love Apple, but this is so Apple: hidden powerful functionality you'll only know about through word of mouth or intentional exploration in the UI.

  • criddell 2 days ago

    It’s also documented in the iPhone User Guide.

    You can get it through Books or on the web:

    https://support.apple.com/en-gb/guide/iphone/iphf2746307f/18...

    • minkles 2 days ago

      No one reads the manuals these days.

      Apart from me apparently.

      • elashri 2 days ago

        I work mainly with undocumented stuff. That taught me to appreciate when there is manuals and documentation for anything and I read them. I don't watch YouTube videos, I read the manual. Of course until I can't figure it out and then still look into YouTube anyway.

  • loloquwowndueo 2 days ago

    Exploring the UI is a perfectly valid method of discovering functionality. What’s the alternative? The phone interrupting you every 2 steps saying hey by the way, you can also do this and this from here?

    • jagged-chisel 2 days ago

      Valid, yes. But this should never be the sole method of discovery.

      Good UX provides clues to discovering additional functionality without intruding on the user.

      What’s the alternative? That’s a question for a UX team - something Apple can certainly afford.

      • loloquwowndueo 2 days ago

        Clicking on a kebab and getting a clearly-labeled “scan document” option seems like an eminently followable clue. It’s not like it’s a minuscule inscrutable icon three levels down.

      • marcellus23 2 days ago

        > Good UX provides clues to discovering additional functionality without intruding on the user.

        This does that. It's behind a button that means "click this for a bunch of stuff you can do here"

    • toomuchtodo 2 days ago

      Now, I’ll probably ask Siri. “How can I scan a document with native iOS functionality?” Hopefully I get the right answer back from the LLM!

      (Admittedly, I have never read the manual for any iPhone I’ve owned; mea culpa)

      • mrbombastic 2 days ago

        It also shows up as a shortcut in spotlight if you search for “Scan Document”

  • Obscurity4340 2 days ago

    Same with number-range call blocking. Gotta pay $4 but it saves you from scammers and other serial callers

manmal 2 days ago

And you can scan to any cloud provider that integrates with Files that way. Dropbox etc

nialse 2 days ago

Mind blown. Thanks for telling me about this gem.

wrs 2 days ago

With an iPad, just open Camera. If it sees a piece of paper, you’ll get a yellow Scan Document button without doing anything.

lobochrome 2 days ago

And you can use the Shortcuts app to create a home screen shortcut for it.

  • treetalker 2 days ago

    You can long-press the Files icon and access it from the iOS context menu too!

cromka 2 days ago

Also worth noting is that if you have a Mac, you can do the same from its Finder and a right click menu.

terraplura 2 days ago

Came here to say the same. I wonder how this app compares. One perk this app provides is you have a button to press from your home screen. With the native feature, you could set up an Apple shortcut to start scanning a document and create a button on your home screen.