Editing URL for Home Screen web shortcuts

[Baron58]

OK, so you can bookmark a webpage and then edit its URL later. Easy enough.

However, when you create an icon on the home screen for a website, I can't seem to find any way to correct the URL after the fact. I need to pass certain parameters in the URL to auto-log-in to a site, but after the page loads, it changes the URL so what I bookmark doesn't have the URL as I'd like it.

Does anyone know of a convenient way to edit the URL that a home-screen shortcut points to?

Thanks,

 

[thelatinist]

After fiddling around with it for a few minutes, I can't see any obvious way of doing this. Sorry.

 

[Pooshka]

Workaround:

1. Open Safari
2. Close all pages; you should see a blank untitled page
3. In the address bar, type your desired final URL
4. Hit the Go button and then the Stop button thereupon
5. Add to Home Screen

Voilà!

 

[Baron58]

After fiddling around with it for a few minutes, I can't see any obvious way of doing this. Sorry.

OK, so it wasn't just me....

Workaround:

1. Open Safari
2. Close all pages; you should see a blank untitled page
3. In the address bar, type your desired final URL
4. Hit the Go button and then the Stop button thereupon
5. Add to Home Screen

Voilà!

I did this and got the shortcut that I was wanting, so my immediate problem is solved. I'm hoping that Apple provides a way to do it "right" in the future.

Thanks.

 

[nevilley]

Session URL problem - continued

I know this is a very old one but I stumbled across it while looking for help. Apologies if this is a massive FAQ and discussed to death elsewhere.

I tried the proposed solution, thank you, but could not make it work as I couldn't stop it fast enough to prevent it from loading a new, long, session URL.

What did work for me, though, was this: put the device in Airplane mode, type in the bare URL, tell it to go there - it fails. Then use that URL to make the home screen icon - and it seems (if you have been careful that it really has failed onto a version with no session data) that you've got a clean version on your home screen. Take it out of airplane mode and check.

To be honest this worked like a charm for me on the iPad; on the iPhone it was fiddly and took several goes to get right, in which I kept getting a version with session data captured - but in the end it was fine. I was maybe just careless/unlucky at first.

I'm sorry it's such a late reply and very sorry if it's useless or a massive duplication. I just hoped it might help someone, or perhaps me as my memory gets worse!

 

[sakau2007]

This is one of many incredibly simple and obvious things that aren't part of iOS and there's really no reason for it to be missing

now it is just time to wait for someone who believes steve jobs was god to defend it

 

[nevilley]

This is one of many incredibly simple and obvious things that aren't part of iOS and there's really no reason for it to be missing

now it is just time to wait for someone who believes steve jobs was god to defend it

Indeed, but I'm just happy that there's a workaround. The point at which I actually go nuts is when they've "protected me from myself" so well that I can't do anything at all!

 

[dakwar]

I'm using iOS 6.0.2 on iPad mini. I want to add http://www.economist.com/printedition/ to the home screen but every time I try, it adds http://www.economist.com/printedition/2012-12-22 as the link, which will load Dec 22's issue every time as opposed to the latest issue, in the future.

The tricks mentioned here for customizing the home screen URL don't work. When wifi is enabled I can't click the stop button soon enough. When the iPad is in airplane mode, the button to add the address to the home screen is grayed out and not selectable.

Anyone have any new ideas? Thanks in advance.

 

[worldlysaint]

There is sort of an app for that

Try the App Icons app. This free app has a lot of cutesy premade icons for commonly used apps on the iPhone, but it also has a section called "Icon Maker" where you can create your own icon for a URL, which once created is passed directly to Safari, where you then save it as a desktop shortcut. Seems to work OK and also allows you to jazz up the icon to a degree, if you wish.

 

[jaknudsen]

Try the App Icons app.

Great tip, thanks! Here's the URL: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/app-icons-free-cool-icon-themes/id749073889?mt=8

 

[slapple]

Try the App Icons app. This free app has a lot of cutesy premade icons for commonly used apps on the iPhone, but it also has a section called "Icon Maker" where you can create your own icon for a URL, which once created is passed directly to Safari, where you then save it as a desktop shortcut. Seems to work OK and also allows you to jazz up the icon to a degree, if you wish.

Thanks! I was looking for a way to edit a Safari URL for a home screen icon. This works great!