Hey, Ive been using OS X for a few years now and hanging around these forums and know a lot of the tricks. But there are still probably some nice things Im not using that I would find useful, even ones I know about. Ive kinda known about the web receipts folder for awhile, but didnt actually use it until yesterday. I suspect a lot of people dont even know it exists. What other nice little touches am I missing out on in OS X?
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I just started using the Web Receipts folder. What else am I missing out on?
- Thread starter devburke
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what are you using it for? I thought the receipts folder was where the history of software updates was stored...
Thats receipts, not web receipts. Web receipts is a folder thats created when you first use it. Its in the print dialog, under the PDF button.
Its basically a place for you to store receipts for online purchases (you know, the ones that say Print this page although nobody ever does). Its created in your Documents folder. Of course, you could do this manually, but this automation is a nice touch.
Not the one that option goes to, but one can save PDFs manually to that folder (a “Save as PDF” option is also under the PDF button), or better yet, create your own option in Automator. Just fire it up and choose the Print Plugin template. It takes a PDF of whatever you’re printing as the input, and when you save the workflow, it’s automatically added under the “PDF” button in the print menu. You could just use the “New Folder” Automator action, which copies the PDF to that folder and creates it if it doesn’t exist already. What you’ll want to be careful about though is preventing overwriting files with the same name. The “web receipts” action used to do this, which was a problem, but as of SL (maybe even as of Leopard, I dunno) it just adds a .2 or something to the filename. I’ll let you figure that out.
I save PDF's to an iDisk web receipts folder.
Can you change the default file location for the Save as PDF to Web Receipts Folder? I never knew that shortcut existed. I don't want it to save PDF's to my local hard disk. Prefer them on my iDisk so it's sync'd between my desktop and laptop and accessible from my iPhone if needed.
Can you change the default file location for the Save as PDF to Web Receipts Folder? I never knew that shortcut existed. I don't want it to save PDF's to my local hard disk. Prefer them on my iDisk so it's sync'd between my desktop and laptop and accessible from my iPhone if needed.
See my post above. Basically the answer is no and yes. You can’t edit the “Save as PDF to Web Receipts Folder” option, but you can create your own (Mail PDF and that stuff are basically just Automator workflows). Choose the Print Plugin template in Automator, and when you save it, your workflow will be added to the PDF menu. Just be careful to make sure your workflow won’t overwrite a previous web receipt with the same name (maybe date/time stamping each one?).
Here’s an example of how you could use a custom Web Receipts folder. Open the workflow and change it to your liking (particularly the destination folder). Right now I have the beginning of the filename date stamped and time stamped. The only way this should overwrite is if you manage to safe two Web Receipts at the exact same time. I guess daylight savings could potentially be a problem, for that one hour that overlaps…but it’s really unlikely. If there’s a way to get Automator to check for existing files, and rename the new one if it already exists, I haven’t figured it out.
Anyway, once you’ve customized this workflow, create a folder called PDF Services in ~/Library and drop it there, or drop it in /Library/PDF Services if you want all users to be able to use it.
Anyway, once you’ve customized this workflow, create a folder called PDF Services in ~/Library and drop it there, or drop it in /Library/PDF Services if you want all users to be able to use it.
Cool beans! Thanks for letting me know about this feature. I have no idea what else I'm not using in OS X! 
Solution
You can change the destination easily, just follow the instructions on this web page:
http://schutt.org/blog/2009/08/osx-pdf-services/
I just made the change myself and set it to my Mobile me Documents/Web Receipts directory
You can change the destination easily, just follow the instructions on this web page:
http://schutt.org/blog/2009/08/osx-pdf-services/
I just made the change myself and set it to my Mobile me Documents/Web Receipts directory
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