Shortcuts and Siri
Every Outbound action in Shortcuts, its parameters and the phrases Siri understands, plus the Focus filter and Spotlight.
Outbound offers eight actions in the Shortcuts app and to Siri: Get Outbound Status, Pause Outbound, Resume Outbound, Switch Outbound Profile, Allow or Block an App, Open Network Monitor, Export Analytics as PDF and Get Connections for App. They run inside Outbound. If an action cannot reach Outbound, it reports “Outbound is not running.” Outbound also offers a Focus filter and can show rules and apps in Spotlight.
Get Outbound status
Section titled “Get Outbound status”Choose “Get Outbound Status” to report whether Outbound is protecting this Mac, the mode, and the active profile. It returns an entity called “Outbound Status” with two properties, “Status” (the sentence) and “Is Protecting” (false while paused or off, so a shortcut that checks it will not treat a pause as protection).
The sentence combines three parts, for example “Protecting · Ask mode · profile Work”. The first part is one of:
- “Protecting”
- “Paused until 3:04 PM”, when a timed pause is active
- “Paused until this Mac restarts”
- “Not protecting”
A mode waiting for approval gains a suffix: “Ask mode · change held”. Before the filter configuration is confirmed, the result is “Protection status unknown. Outbound is waiting for the filter.” and “Is Protecting” is false.
Pause Outbound
Section titled “Pause Outbound”Pauses Outbound. The “Minutes” parameter accepts 1 to 1440 minutes (one minute to 24 hours), 15 by default. Outbound’s rules aren’t enforced until the pause ends, while speed limits stay on, and the pause asks for approval, the same as pausing in the app. Siri hears “Pause Outbound” and “Pause Outbound for a few minutes”.
Resume Outbound
Section titled “Resume Outbound”Ends a pause and starts filtering again. Replies “Outbound is filtering again.”
Switch Outbound profile
Section titled “Switch Outbound profile”“Switch Outbound Profile” switches the active profile. The “Profile” parameter lists your profiles plus “No Profile”, which turns profile rules off. Switching to a profile that would loosen protection asks for approval. If a profile was deleted after the shortcut was built, the shortcut reports “That profile no longer exists.”
Allow or block an app
Section titled “Allow or block an app”“Allow or Block an App” allows or blocks an app’s outgoing connections. It takes a “Verdict” (Allow or Block) and the app either as a file picked in Shortcuts (“App”) or as a “Bundle Path” typed in; the file wins when both are given. Allowing asks for approval, the same as adding the rule yourself. With neither input the shortcut fails with “Choose an app, or enter the path to its .app bundle.” The selected path must identify an existing .app bundle; otherwise Outbound reports “Choose an application (.app).” or “Outbound cannot find that app.”
Open Network Monitor
Section titled “Open Network Monitor”Opens Outbound’s window on the Network Monitor. If Outbound is still starting, it reports “Outbound is still opening. Try again shortly.”
Export Analytics as PDF
Section titled “Export Analytics as PDF”Exports the last seven days of analytics as a PDF file, which the shortcut can save, share or pass to the next action.
Get Connections for App
Section titled “Get Connections for App”“Get Connections for App” reads today’s figures for one app, from local midnight until now. Pick the app from the list of apps with recorded connections. It returns an entity called “Connections Today” with three properties: “Connections”, “Bytes Sent” and “Bytes Received”. Byte counts are sampled, as in Analytics.
Focus filter
Section titled “Focus filter”In System Settings › Focus, choose a Focus, then add Outbound under Focus filters. You can choose an Outbound profile to use while that Focus is on, or keep the current one, and you can turn on “Silence connection alerts”. When the Focus ends, Outbound goes back to the profile it was using before.
While alerts are silenced, unanswered connections keep their normal timeout action. Switching to a profile still asks for any approval you have set up.
Spotlight
Section titled “Spotlight”Outbound adds your rules and the apps it has seen to Spotlight, so you can search for a rule or an app and open it in Outbound. Only names on this Mac are indexed; the hosts your apps connect to never are. To turn it off, clear “Show rules and apps in Spotlight” in Settings › General.
App shortcuts
Section titled “App shortcuts”Outbound registers four system shortcuts, visible in the Shortcuts app and available to Siri without building anything:
| Name | Phrases | Icon |
|---|---|---|
| Status | “Get Outbound status”, “Is Outbound protecting” | shield |
| Pause | “Pause Outbound”, “Pause Outbound for a few minutes” | pause |
| Resume | “Resume Outbound”, “Unpause Outbound” | play |
| Switch Profile | “Switch Outbound profile to (profile)”, “Set Outbound profile to (profile)” | grouped rectangles |
Each appears in the app shortcuts section with a short title: “Status”, “Pause”, “Resume”, “Switch Profile”.