Here are some examples of Shortcuts you can build with Zavala. You can customize them to your particular needs and use them as a learning resource.

Global Search and Replace

This Shortcut will scan all the Outlines in Zavala for the word “Paris” and replace it with “London”. You can customize it to limit it to only the Outlines you want to change and modify the search and replace commands.

This one searches all the Outlines for any that contain the word “Blog” and then tags found Outlines with the “Blog” tag.

Make Most Played Outline

This is a demo of how to create an Outline and populate it with Rows.

Append to Personal Tasks

We get input, typically from another Shortcut, and append it to an Outline called “Personal Tasks”.

This Shortcut only works on iOS because some Safari features are currently missing on macOS.

We add an item to the Share Sheet on iOS that is the name of this Shortcut. If an application shares a URL, we will take it and append it to the end of an Outline called “Personal Tasks”. This is an easy way to track things that you want to read later along with other tasks you may be working on.

Move Completed Rows to Done

This Shortcut assumes that you have an outline named “TODO”, with completed rows, and one row with the topic “Done” at the top level.

Archive Account

You can use this shortcut to create a Zavala archive. This is a zip file with OPML exports and any associated images from the selected Account. You can use this archive to backup your Account or use it to migrate to another outline application.

To restore the archive to an account, you will want to delete all the outlines in that account and then use the Restore Account Shortcut load the archive.

Restore Account

You can use this Shortcut to restore a Zavala archive to an Account. You will probably want to delete all the Outlines in the Account prior to executing this Shortcut or you will end up with duplicates.

Export to Reminders

This shortcut will take the currently selected Outline and export it to Reminders as a Reminder List with Tasks taken from the Outline’s rows.

Migraine Log

This example is useful for logging information using a template Row as a starting point. In this case, we are logging migraine headaches and associated symptoms. See the comments in the Shortcut for more information.

If you want to make sure that every one of your Outlines has a Tag this is the Shortcut for you. It scans for Outlines with missing Tags and gives them a “No Tag” Tag. You can then add Tags to the found Outlines and delete the “No Tag” Tag when done.

Use ChatGPT to Create an Outline

Sometimes just getting started is the hardest part. Here we use ChatGPT to create an outline of features that an outliner application should have. You can customize this Shortcut by changing the first sentence in the ChatGPT box to what ever interests you. Now you have an outline you can edit and customize in Zavala to get you started.