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rdub76 Author

Level 1

9 points

I cannot delete iPhone keyboard shortcuts. They keep restoring.

I have deleted old keyboard shortcuts that were no longer used and added new ones using the same shortcut. For instance typing "eml" would auto-fill with my old email address. I deleted this shortcut and made a new one - "eml" = new email address. iCloud keeps restoring the old shortcuts, so now I have two "eml" shortcuts with two different email addresses. Also, old shortcuts are constantly being restored! I cannot delete any shortcut! They will delete for a couple of days and then they are "restored" to my iPhone. How the heck do you permanently delete keyboard shortcuts in iOS? I tried turning off backup, deleting, turning on, waiting, updating to no avail. Is there a way to completely wipe the backup/settings file stored in iCloud for an iOS device?

Posted on Nov 7, 2014 11:46 AM

Top-ranking reply

LookInToMyEyes

Level 1

5 points

Posted on Jul 13, 2015 2:46 PM

Keyboard Shortcut returning solution

Wow it is insane the amount of people who are having this issue. The reason this error exist because of a corrupt backup/ local keyboard files. Your iPhone has created multiple folders for the keyboard shortcut and iCloud can't delete those and because of this your backups only delete on iPhone and not on iCloud because they are not in the proper folder. IMPORTANT: All your shortcuts are being uploaded to iCloud even the ones you can not delete. Once you attempt to delete them iCloud does delete them (Temporary because your iPhone has a corrupt backup that won't delete it and it just gets restore back)

The solution is very simple.

You could start from a scratch iPhone and lose all your information or you can modify your backup and delete the corrupted files. As I said earlier, your iCloud backup has all your keyboard shortcuts backed up so you won't lose any of them, make sure you do an iCloud backup.

Step one

Backup your iPhone to iTunes.

Step two

You will need a program that can read iTune's backup

Step Three

open the program and select your latest backup from the left hand side of the program

Navigate to

System files > KeyboardDomain

Once inside the Keyboard domain select > Library > Keyboard

Delete "CoreDataUbiquitySupport"

Before you delete it let me explain whats inside. Go ahead and open the coredata folder, there should only be two folders (By Default) in here, but as you can see you have more than two. This is all local and because of that your backups keep coming back because your iPhone keeps reading all the folders when it should only be reading the default one that iCloud gives you.

Step four

Restore your iPhone using iTunes and using this backup. Once your iPhone connects to iCloud it will download your keyboard shortcuts and in the corrupted folder there will only be two folders (Or how many your iCloud reads) making it corrected.

Should anyone have questions or answers please feel free to contact me. This modification is 100% safe as long as you delete what I told you to. Any typos or errors I apologize. I rather fix the issue than waste 1 hour explaining or fixing my typos. I came across this issue on a few iPhones at my company and I had to come up with a solution.

Chris

View in context

647 replies

Jan 27, 2016 9:34 AM in response to Peter Oram1

Wow. 43 pages and this is STILL going on.

I've now discovered that iOS to iOS synching of shortcuts works fine fine me. However, iOS to OS X or OS X to OS X doesn't work at all.

I've logged out and in to iCloud on my Macs. What else can I do?

Feb 18, 2016 6:13 AM in response to Italofontana

I dont know if you ever got a decent answer.

The easy way to add/remove stuff without getting all technical is to go to

you Settings:

then General:

then Keyboard:

And last

TEXT REPLACEMENT.

Here you will be able to edit/delete any words added.

Hope this helps!

Apr 5, 2016 3:05 PM in response to pagemakers4

oh yeah, I've completely left this & any troubleshooting for an entire 6 months. Decided to peek in to see any new devs & fixes... no such "good" news.

As I've closed down ALL aspects of my life [publishing/promotion/etc] on which I was counting on this to work in that time, do I even bother to try again??? 😐

iceycake

Level 1

11 points

Apr 6, 2016 11:55 AM in response to HansWorldTravels

I have these problem for a long time and I did post something in this thread for awhile back. I believe I have fixed the problem (for months already) and I want to share it here.

1. Goto Settings | General | Keyboards | Text Relacement

2. Instead of deleting the zombie shortcuts, try to rename the shortcut. For example, "omw"->"on my way" changes to "zzz" -> "on my way". Save it.

3. Wait for a few hours. Sometimes, you will see both omw and zzz in the shortcuts. Don't panic. Just delete them one each time and wait for a few hours.

4. If the rename/delete method works, you can repeat the same steps.

Jul 14, 2016 1:10 PM in response to pagemakers4

Hi, I saw the fix you referenced on page 7 and the many people who attempted to use it. But I cannot seem to find the name of the application that allows you to go in to the iTunes backup and delete the icloud shortcuts. Can you help advise me on some apps available? I searched for some myself, but none of them work on my computer or are not made to accomplish this specific task!

Please help. I have full restored my iphone 4S multiple times as well as factory reset- the shortcuts actually follow me from phone to phone.... It doesn't matter how much data I lose, the shortcuts return... which makes sense because the apple ID and icloud account are still the same.

Now I have purchased a new phone and it's time to end this once and for all! I hope you can help me find a program that works. For now my phone is backed up onto a core 2 duo intel iMac that runs OS 10.6.8.

Thank you.

Nov 8, 2016 3:50 PM in response to iBarrett

@iBarrett, do you know if this process still applies to macOS Sierra 10,12,1? Also, do you happen to have any links to resources about the hidden folders, and their files, that reside in each person's iCloud account? I haven't done any searching yet, but this is something I've been wanting to learn more about! I really appreciated finding your post!

I tried the procedure you described, but when it came to adding the .plist extension and viewing the Text Replacements, that part didn't work for me...and I wasn't completely sure to what file I should be adding .plist.

Any additional information you have or resources you can direct me to, I would greatly appreciate it! 🙂

Nov 9, 2016 9:54 PM in response to braintoniq

@braintoniq, I realize you've found the procedure on page 32, but I just wanted to let you know that I experienced the same thing you did –– my Real iCloud Drive showed the 'Mobile Documents' folder, as well, and the contents looked very similar to yours. I did not have a Settings folder either.

Oct 22, 2015 9:08 PM in response to gregory202

iOS 9 Keyboard/messages locking/lagging...only hard reboot as option

Has anyone else experienced this??

iBarrett

Level 1

2 points

Jan 27, 2015 5:19 PM in response to rdub76

Confirmed NO FIX IN iOS 8.1.3

Still crashes in settings app and theres no way to delete/edit any shortcuts. This is insanity.

Feb 4, 2015 6:11 AM in response to rdub76

Still no fixes..

my shortcut down going to double and tripple.. all my deleted shortcut were restored back..

zoso4

Level 1

28 points

Feb 12, 2015 2:58 PM in response to romanaleksandrov

Not everyone has a computer. Apple still needs to fix this. I have them deleted for now. But they'll probably come back somehow.

zoso4

Level 1

28 points

Feb 22, 2015 9:41 PM in response to Marko Armani

I ended up restoring my iPhone as new. That did the trick. It wiped all shortcuts and I was able to start fresh. Restoring as new is not fun. But I'm no longer bothered by unwanted shortcuts.

Mar 1, 2015 9:14 AM in response to zoso4

???

Is this for a jailbroken phone?

var/mobile ???

zoso4

Level 1

28 points

Mar 1, 2015 12:44 PM in response to Marko Armani

I Think his is jailbroken. But I saw this somewhere else too. Here at this site:

http://www.sinfuliphone.com/showthread.php?p=975313

Mar 1, 2015 12:54 PM in response to zoso4

Jailbroken for sure. So, basically useless for most people's situation. Also, since this isn't your own phone, this is (at best) anecdotal and unconfirmed.

I cannot delete iPhone keyboard shortcuts. They keep restoring.