Tasker 5.8 adds new features to automate your Apps, Bluetooth devices, Music playback, and more

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Tasker is undoubtedly one of the most popular Android apps in the advanced segment. It has over a million downloads and 4.6 rating in the Play Store. The fairly new developer behind the app, João Dias, has been releasing quality updates ever since he took over the project. Today, he released yet another update, Tasker 5.8, to the stable channel. It brings a lot of new features and changes which improve the overall experience of the app. Without further ado, let’s dig into the update.

The biggest and most important feature Tasker 5.8 brings is 3rd-party app integration. This one simple change lets you automate virtually anything concerning the apps on your phone. “App Changed” event lets you trigger a command every time you switch to this app. There is also “App Info” action which gives you all kinds of information about any app, like usage statistics. You can create variables and assign them to tasks to limit apps’ permissions or automate various functions. The next big feature is concerning Bluetooth connections. Starting with Tasker 5.8, you can automate tasks every time a Bluetooth device connects to your phone. You can also get information from connected devices and force connect/disconnect and pair/unpair them. You can see the examples in the video below.

There are also new actions which let you handle HTTP requests, even the authorization via OAuth 2.0. I can already see loads of useful tasks made by scraping 3rd-party or your own websites. Tasker 5.8 also includes new InputDialog which will help you customize the specifics of the imported tasks. Tasker can now adapt to music playback by identifying the change of the track. This can lead to many audio or streaming service-related tasks. There is also now a full backup option, which will help you transfer your Tasker setup (even the variables and settings) to a whole new device. Tasker is available in the Play Store for $2.99, and I assure you that it is worth every cent.

Here’s the full changelog of Tasker 5.8.

Tasker 5.8 Changelog Added Added App Changed event which triggers every time the foreground app is changed.

event which triggers every time the foreground app is changed. Added App Info action which returns a lot of info for the chosen apps. You can get info for the current app, for a previously opened app (like the previous app that was open, the second to last app, the third to last, etc), for an app that was opened X seconds ago (for example, the app that was opened 60 seconds ago) and for your most used apps (including the time you spent on the apps or the times the apps were open in a given timespan)

action which returns a lot of info for the chosen apps. You can get info for the current app, for a previously opened app (like the previous app that was open, the second to last app, the third to last, etc), for an app that was opened X seconds ago (for example, the app that was opened 60 seconds ago) and for your most used apps (including the time you spent on the apps or the times the apps were open in a given timespan) Made all actions that allow you to select apps (like the Launch App , Kill App , Network Access and Media Control actions) be able to set the app as a variable instead of just a static selection. Demo for 3 above features here. Get the demo project here.

, , and actions) be able to set the app as a variable instead of just a static selection. Demo for 3 above features here. Get the demo project here. Added HTTP Request action which allows you to do HTTP Requests of any type (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc) with any headers, body and file contents

action which allows you to do HTTP Requests of any type (GET, POST, PUT, DELETE, etc) with any headers, body and file contents Added HTTP Auth action which allows OAuth 2.0 and Username and Password authentication. Demo for the HTTP features here.

action which allows OAuth 2.0 and Username and Password authentication. Demo for the HTTP features here. Added Bluetooth Connection action which allows you to force connect/disconnect/pair/unpair a BT device. Demo here.

action which allows you to force connect/disconnect/pair/unpair a BT device. Demo here. Added Bluetooth Connection event which triggers when a BT device is connected/disconnected and gives you a bunch of variables with the BT device’s info. Demo here.

event which triggers when a BT device is connected/disconnected and gives you a bunch of variables with the BT device’s info. Demo here. Added Bluetooth Info action that allows you to get info on a single device, bonded devices or devices that can be scanned

action that allows you to get info on a single device, bonded devices or devices that can be scanned Added Music Track Changed event – triggers every time music starts/stops/changes track; provides a lot of variables with track info (%track, %artist, %album, etc)

event – triggers every time music starts/stops/changes track; provides a lot of variables with track info (%track, %artist, %album, etc) Added Input Dialog action to easily get a value from the user, without having to use the Variable Query Tasker scene. May be useful when sharing a project via Taskernet and setting a Launch Task to gather input from the user. Previously if user already had Variable Query scene, import would not work because of existing scene. Demo here.

action to easily get a value from the user, without having to use the Variable Query Tasker scene. May be useful when sharing a project via Taskernet and setting a Launch Task to gather input from the user. Previously if user already had Variable Query scene, import would not work because of existing scene. Demo here. Added option in Media Control action to try to use notifications to control if available, making it much more reliable

action to try to use notifications to control if available, making it much more reliable Added option in Preferences > Misc to include user variables in backups

Added option in Data Backup action to include user variables

action to include user variables Added Max Rounding Digits option to the Variable Set action when Do Maths is enabled: allows you to choose how many decimals you want to use for your math operations

option to the action when is enabled: allows you to choose how many decimals you want to use for your math operations Ability for Tasker events to set local variables in the entry task like plugins already did. The App Changed event is using this new system

Allows you to once again use the Services option in the App State condition by granting Tasker the android.permission.DUMP permission Changes Made %WIN updates faster and more reliable

%MTRACK now uses notification listener (in addition to the old method) to make it more reliable

Made adding new events much easier for the developer, so I’ll have a much easier time to add new ones now 😉

Made all newer actions (the ones I’ve implemented) proceed in the task right away instead of some of them waiting ~1 second

Fix scenes not displaying variable values correctly

Made null output variables be empty instead of having the text “null”

Mobile Network condition now needs the READ_PHONE_STATE permission because it now uses a newer (more accurate) way of getting the state.

condition now needs the READ_PHONE_STATE permission because it now uses a newer (more accurate) way of getting the state. Added timeout to Authentication Dialog action. Otherwise it could get stuck forever.

When a new task can’t be queued show a warning flash with the reason instead of just silently not working

Don’t automatically focus on label when editing action if label is set

Added warnings that old HTTP actions are deprecated and that the HTTP Request should always be used instead Bugfixes Start Monitor in Foreground earlier to avoid crashes

Fixed long standing bug where Run Shell action would get stuck if output was too large

action would get stuck if output was too large Fixed long standing bug where sometimes when you gave permissions to multiple SD cards, Tasker would stop being able to access them

Fix long standing bug where deleting a folder on an SD Card would not work if the folder was empty

Fixed getting Mobile Data type for the Mobile Network state (now considers connected mobile type instead of configured mobile type)

Fixed long standing bug where screenshots taken with the Take Screenshot action would end up with wrong dimensions

action would end up with wrong dimensions Fixed not being able to get some app icons

Fixed issue where sometimes task or profile list would be blank until Tasker was restarted

Fixed crash when showing task list on some devices

Mobile Data action now asks for root permission. It was mistakenly not asking for it before.

Fixed bug where sometimes receiving phone calls could stop the app monitor and would stop triggering app related profiles

Made some wrong error messages disapear from the Tasker log

When Google Sign in fails, show actual error that occurred instead of the generic “Result not OK”

Made all toasts show with the application context and on the main thread

Fixed asking for Write System Settings for Navigation Bar action

Fixed crash when using very large javascript libraries

Fixed some crashes

Source: Tasker