Submitted by Frank Macey on
One of the cool things that iOS 5 will offer when Apple releases the new mobile operating system is the capability to create custom shortcuts that can be used when entering text. Of course you can have this feature right now if you jailbreak your iPhone and install the utility called Xpandr using the Cydia app store.
Xpandr costs $1.99 and can be found in Cydia under Sections -> Utilities or by using the Search function. Payment is simple and uses either PayPal or Amazon Payments directly in the Cydia app store. Once installed, Xpandr can be configured by tapping its icon on the home screen.
Once launched Xpandr has a preferences section that allows you to toggle Enable Xpandr -> ON. Below this is a list of macros, which are the shortcuts you can create. To add a text shortcut to the list, touch the Edit button in the upper right corner of the app. Touch the plus button (+) and you will see two text fields. The top field is for your shortcut, and the bottom one indicates the Value of the shortcut, or the text that will be expanded whenever the shortcut is entered in a text field.
Once installed, Xpandr will expand your text shortcuts in any app and any text field on your device. An unlimited number of Macros can be entered into the app for later use. This functionality saves a lot of time for those who are constantly entering the same text over and over again.
iOS 5 will feature this functionality under Settings -> General -> Keyboard -> Add New Shortcut when the firmware is released later this fall.