New IFTTT app launches with iPhone-only photo, reminder and contacts recipes

The versatile Web-based productivity tool IFTTT (an acronym for "If This Then That") released an iOS app on Thursday that marries the utility of its Internet-connected actions and triggers with the convenience of an iPhone.

For those who are unaware, IFTTT is a Web tool that lets users trigger automated online actions from a number of websites and services, all using the simple statement, "if this then that."

The service is based on recipes that contain triggers and actions, which in turn collect or move data across the Internet. An example recipe would be sending an email from Gmail (action) at a certain time (trigger), with ingredients being the title, body and recipient list. The site also has channels for popular Web services like Facebook, email and LinkedIn, among others.

For the iOS version, which is currently only available for iPhone, IFTTT brings channel activation and recipe creation, as well as exclusive photo, contact and reminder actions. These iOS-only assets can be used for recipes like automatically sending pictures to Dropbox, or creating a spreadsheet of reminders in Google Drive.

Channel setup is a bit tedious, as each service needs to be logged into before use, but recipe creation is much easier on the iPhone, with actions and triggers and actions selectable in a slick, clean user interface.

Users can browse or search for popular recipes, or link to an existing IFTTT account. The app also allows for background syncing of recipes created on the Web client.

IFTTT for iOS is a free 12MB download from the App Store.