Access to macOS file -> Quick Access -> Create PDF ?

JohannesSchv · June 9, 2026, 12:09pm

I'd like to have a shortcut to create a PDF from a macOS files. It is the inbuild ones and I don't know why but create PDF does not show up in system preferences -> keyboard -> shortcuts. While "convert picture" does.

Can I access this via BTT anyhow? I need it every day for my work.

Andreas_Hegenberg · June 9, 2026, 1:32pm

I'd recommend to create a shortcut in Apple's Shortcuts app, these can be called from BTT:

(if it does not show up immediately after creating the shortcut, restart BTT)

JohannesSchv · June 9, 2026, 1:59pm

Thanks will do. Do you know what I can do to get the converted image at the same folder location as the original? Can't replace Desktop in my example

Andreas_Hegenberg · June 9, 2026, 2:10pm

This should work (need to set the main folder to your user's folder)

JohannesSchv · June 9, 2026, 2:48pm

Thanks! Almost:

"Get Parent directory" must be above "Make PDF..."

Andreas_Hegenberg · June 9, 2026, 3:35pm

I can't think of a reason why the order would matter here, but glad you got it to work!

JohannesSchv · June 11, 2026, 8:06am

True. It was another reason, sorry. But it works.

And I must say: thank you again for your help. Why? In the first place I assigned Shortcut via System Preferences/ Keyboard/ Shortcuts/ Services. But those aren't reliable here under macOS Tahoe and before anymore. (I gave up on Apple due to so much bad things going on.) Sometimes I got my JPG/ PDF, but after that I get the system audio error sound. Nothing is going on anymore.

Now I assigned Shortcut via BetterTouchTool. It works. Job Done. Cheers!

Only thing I adress again within BTT.app: I don't like its UI anymore, I got always weird columns. It is so hard to work with it for me. Please see the orange line-dots below the 2nd picture. I want them to be fixed forever, in percentage (as depended on BTT in full screen, half screen, etc.)

Andreas_Hegenberg · June 11, 2026, 8:40am

unfortunately a percentage based approach does not work unless you keep the window at a very large width all the time.

You can change some of the minimum widths here, maybe that will help you:

The general resizing behavior of the split views has improved a bit with macOS 26.