Apple AirTags are great to find lost objects, however, they only display the current location, and not all places they've been. This is a way around it as well as an interesting application to make use of Mac Automator. The Intego Mac Podcast last week (search for it on the Apple Podcasts application) I was listening to the podcast and came across an interesting article about AirTags. Someone had sent an AirTag via post and was looking to track it to have enjoyment. But, this is the problem of tracing it.
When it is the Find My app is opened on an Apple Mac, the current position of all your devices which includes AirTags will be displayed. However, there isn't a information about the location. You can tell the location where something is right now however, you don't know where it was similar to the place it was just one hour earlier. If you don't sit at your Mac and gaze at the screen all day, writing down where AirTags or devices appear at, you won't be aware of where they've been.
There's no history of locations for locations in Find My, so how can an AirTag be monitored in time? The solution that the team came up with is to create the script to take the screenshot every few minutes in Find My. Find My app. When the changing location occurs the Find My place is updated and the screenshot record it by taking a screenshot. You can then look through the archive of screenshots and find out which location an AirTag was throughout the day or evening.
I was pondering how I could take snapshots on a regular basis using the Mac. Making a single screenshot is easy and there's even the option of taking an image that is timed. Press Shift+Cmd+5 then click Option. You can capture a screenshot in either 5 or 10 second time. The single screenshot has useless for tracking areas in Find My, so I decided to develop an application to perform the task. It seemed as if something Automator could handle and proved to be simple.
What can you do with Automator to create timed snapshots? It's as easy as four easy steps and it's able to run whatever time you'd like to save whatever's visible on the screen to the disk. Monitoring AirTag places in The Find My app is just one of the possible uses for the Automator application.
Create an Automator application
Start Automator in the Applications folder on the Mac. It's built-in and comes with macOS. When you're asked to select a type of document, choose the Application. We'll make an application that will be run just like any other app running on your Mac.
Drag-and-drop Automator actions
Choose from the Library in the first listing then drag the four items in the second list into the the right. The > button allows you that allows you to increase or decrease the size of every item, and I've condensed each in order to make it easier for you to understand. Select these actions and then include them to your list: Take Screenshots Take Screenshots, Find Finder Items that are specified Rename Finder Items, and Loop.
Create a screenshot using Automator
The Take Screenshot action looks like this when it is expanded. It takes a picture of the entire screen automatically. All you have to do is tick the Timed box and select the frequency you wish to capture screen shots. I set it at 300 seconds. This equals five minutes.
Save Automator screenshots
Click Save to and then select Create. In Finder you will need to create the folder that you wish to save your screenshots in. Also, you need to save a fake PNG file to that folder. Any old image will work. It's only an empty placeholder. I created a folder titled Screenshots. I then saved a file in the folder called Pic.png however the name isn't important. Select the file , then select save. The Take Screenshot Automator program will take a screenshot and save it using the name of the file in the folder.
Access files using Automator
The problem is that every screenshot is stored using the same filename, which is the one that is specified by the Take Screenshot action. The solution is to change the name of the file afterward. In the Get specified items in the Finder action, then click to the button to add the button, and then select the PNG dummy file you've added to the folder you wish to save your screenshots to. You can see here that I chose Pic.png. The name doesn't matter so long as it's identical to the name used in this Take Screenshot action.
Rename files using Automator
The output of the Get Specified the Finder Items is used as the input to Rename Finder Items and we are able to change the name of the screenshot and give it a unique name to ensure it doesn't overwrite one the other. Choose the option to add the date or time on the right. Change the Format to Hour Minute Second Set the Separator to Dash. Leading zeros can be used in the event you want.
What it does is use the name of the screenshot, Pic.png, and add the date like Pic 10-27-14.png. The time, hour, and second in which the picture is taken will be distinct (unless you let this run throughout the day for more than 24 hours). The result will be a little similar to the method macOS labels screenshots.
Create loops inside Automator
We'd like to continue taking screenshots every time we reach the interval that is set by the Take Screenshot action (300 seconds) This is why we need to increase your Loop action, then set the action to Loop continuously and then end after a set amount of time. It's up to you however, 600 minutes equals 10 hours, which means that the Automator script will save screen shots every five minutes for a period of 10 hours.
Check out the screenshot app
It is important to test the app before you use it. This is not just to verify that it is working as it should, but also to set permissions. The first time an app starts, macOS will ask if it's OK for the application to take a screenshot of the screen. It will ask if is okay to let it save the screen to the disk. You must run it once in order to check the permissions that are displayed.
You may need access System Preferences > Security and Privacy Privacy and enable Screen Recording as well as Folders and Files as well as full Disk Access. It's all about security within macOS nowadays and you're not allowed to perform anything without permission to five places.
If you want to test this app, may need to make sure you Take Screenshot to 15 seconds and loop up to one minute. Save and run the application to verify it's taking screenshots and stops at the end of the minute. If everything is fine then load the app into Automator and change the interval and the total time to whatever you like. Save the app and it's available for use.
Screen savers and power management
We're almost done and there are only few things left to be done. If you plan to take images from Find My locations over several hours, ensure that the Mac isn't in a sleep mode! Connect the MacBook directly into the primary power source supply and change the System preferences > Battery > Preferences Adapter to ensure that you never disable the display. Make sure to tick the box, to prevent the computer from automatically sleeping...
If you use this Automator application for a long period of time to take screenshots of Find My, start Find My then run Automator screenshot app. Automator screenshot application, then reduce the brightness of the screen down, leave the screen and go away. When an Automator app is running the app, a wheel of cogs is displayed in the main menu. Click it if you wish to end the program prior to when the Loop timer is scheduled to stop.
