Posted by: glasskeys | 06/23/2011

How to add web links to the home screen on the iPad & iPhone.

(To view a larger image with a more detailed description tap or click a thumbnail.)

My post yesterday on web apps reminded me that it would be prudent to mention to my readers how one could make a shortcut icon to a web page or app appear on the home screen of their iPad or iPhone. It is probably one of the most overlooked features of Safari on these devices, yet extremely simple to do.

To create one yourself, open Safari, and browse to a web site, I chose Apple.com for illustration purposes. On the toolbar tap the button that has an image of an arrow surrounded by a rectangle, then tap the Add to Home Screen button in the list of menu options. In the Add To Home dialog, change the description if desired and tap the blue Add button at top right. You have now placed a “shortcut icon” that links to apple.com on your home screen.

On a related topic, you may need to create icon groups if you find your home screen becoming a bit cluttered with new hordes of invading shortcut icons.

(Use the tag cloud at right to view similar topics.)


Responses

  1. Is there no way to change the icon image that is used for the shortcuts?

  2. Dave,

    I currently don’t know of any way, there may be a way to trick the process by placing the remote web app in an iFrame and use your own custom image icon for the main page hosting the frame via css stylesheet.

    The caveat is that you would have to keep your web page with the frames, hosted on a site you control just to use your own custom icons.

    I will look into it, but I am cannot promise anything mate.

    Kind regards,
    Stephen

  3. Yes you can do it but its tricky, you have get a icon uploader from the apple development kit – its erally easy once you figure it out – only thing is you need an apple dev key to get it so maybe someone could post it?

  4. Hello just wanted to give you a quick heads up. The text in your
    article seem to be running off the screen in Safari.
    I’m not sure if this is a formatting issue or something to do with web browser compatibility but I thought I’d post to let you know.
    The style and design look great though! Hope
    you get the problem resolved soon. Cheers


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