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Birthday Ambush
Nuisance

Birthday Ambush

On their birthday, their favourite apps sing.

Download shortcut⏱ 1m setup

Open in Safari on your iPhone. Download the file, open it from Safari Downloads or Files, then follow the prompts to add it in Shortcuts.

What happens

On their birthday, the first five times they open one of their favourite apps, an 8-bit Happy Birthday blasts out and a “HAPPY BIRTHDAY” notification drops in. Every other day of the year it does nothing.

Setup

  1. Open this page in Safari on the iPhone, download the file (or AirDrop it), open it from Safari Downloads or Files, and tap Add Shortcut.
  2. While importing, it asks for their birthday as MM-DD (14 July is 07-14). Fill it in before tapping Add Shortcut.
  3. Long-press it in Shortcuts → All Shortcuts → Rename and call it App Helper, so it doesn’t give itself away.
  4. A normal test does nothing unless today matches the birthday. To test now, open the … editor, temporarily set the birthday Text action to today’s MM-DD, run while unlocked and choose Always Allow where offered, then restore the actual birthday. Delete only birthday-ambush-count.txt from Files → iCloud Drive → Shortcuts → shortcut-to-hell to reset the five-play limit after testing.
  5. Shortcuts → Automation → + → App, pick up to 5 apps they live in and choose Is Opened, select Run Immediately, tap Next and choose the shortcut.

Undo

Open Shortcuts → Automation, swipe left on the automation and tap Delete. Then delete the shortcut. Restore media volume and audio output in Control Center.

State and testing

The saved state lives in Files → iCloud Drive → Shortcuts → shortcut-to-hell: birthday-ambush-count.txt. Keep iCloud Drive available. Manual runs affect the same counters as automation runs. Deleting this shortcut does not delete its saved state.

Test the trigger

Installing the file does not create its automation. After the manual test, trigger the event once and check the result. If the shortcut picker is unavailable, create a blank automation, add Run Shortcut, and select this shortcut. Menus, previews and app-opening actions may still need interaction or an unlocked phone even with Run Immediately selected. If it stops, run from the shortcut’s … editor to identify the failing action.

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