Comparison

a vs Site Config

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

a

Run Unix commands locally on your iOS device with a powerful terminal emulator. Supports file transfer, editing, scripting with Python and Lua, and network utilities. Integrates with Shortcuts and supports multiple windows for multitasking.

Highlights
  • Local Unix terminal emulator
  • SSH client
  • File transfer (scp, curl)
  • Text editing (vim, ed)
  • Scripting (Python, Lua, JavaScript)
  • Network utilities (nslookup, ping)
  • Shortcuts integration
  • Multi-window support
Features
Read full description

a-Shell mini is a complete local terminal emulator, allowing to run most Unix commands on you iOS device. You can transfer files using scp and curl, edit them with vim and ed, process them using grep, awk and sed. Work with git repositories using lg2. Most commands are compiled for iOS native Arm64 format, making them fast and well integrated with iOS underlying BSD Unix. a-Shell mini includes Python, Lua, JavaScript and webAssembly for programming and scripting. It also includes native ffmpeg and convert for fast image and video conversion. There are also multiple network utilities: nslookup, ping, whois, ifconfig... Type help for help, help -l to get the full list of commands. a-Shell mini can be controlled from Shortcuts: run commands in order, process files in a-Shell, get the results as text or files, transfer files to other apps... a-Shell mini uses iPadOS 13+ “multiple windows” ability, so you can run multiple shells at the same time, with different commands, in different directories. You can edit a file in one window with vim and process it in the other with python. a-Shell mini is a minimalist terminal, designed to have a very small footprint (less than 250 MB). If you need more commands, please consider a-Shell, which has more Python packages, more JavaScript modules, Perl, make, a C and C++ compiler and TeX.

About

Site Config

Features
Read full description

Site Config can help creating text extraction rules compatible with FiveFilters, Fiery Feeds and Paper Press. You can visually pick or hide specific elements to filter which parts you want to include in the output and which you want to hide. - Web View - You can view the web version of the site and visually pick elements using the selection tool to mark them either as content or to hide them. It can alternatively also show the HTML content of the target site. - Rules View - The rules view shows the textual representation of the created views and allows for more developer centric editing of the rules. This view is optional and can be hidden if you don’t need it. - Preview - Shows the live results of the created rules applied to the loaded website, either as article, as HTML or as a list of found metadata. - Intelligence - You can use Apple Intelligence, if supported on your device, or 3rd party providers like Claude or OpenAI, if you bring your own API key to automatically create the rules for a given website. - Siri Shortcuts - You can use Site Config to fetch the content from websites in Siri Shortcuts

Screenshots

a4 screens
Site Config3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is update cadence: Site Config at every 3 days against a's monthly. a's advantage is chart position (#49 vs unranked) and iOS requirement (14.0 vs 17.4). On price, ads, in-app purchases and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

a ships an update monthly, Site Config every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on October 25, 2026 and October 24, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard3 real differences · 8 level
a versus Site Config: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameteraSite Config
PriceFreeFree
Rating4.6 (122 ratings) — better—
Positive reviews78.0% of reviews—
Number of ratings122 — better—
Update frequencyMonthlyEvery 3 days — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationPaid—
Best chart rank#49 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, Mac
Requires iOS14.0 — better17.4
Further details — not scored
Size383 MB58 MB
Age rating17+17+
DeveloperNicolas HolzschuchLukas Burgstaller

Bugs and requests

a

Reported bugs

12 issues
  • Keyboard icons comically large
  • App deletes itself
  • Rotating iPhone/iPad scrambles display
  • Pasting text results in strange characters
  • App only uses half of the screen when editing files
Show 7 more
  • Command not found errors for all commands
  • App crashes on launch after update
  • Cannot get own absolute path
  • Cannot execute own programs
  • App messes up .txt file association
  • Trouble selecting characters to copy and paste
  • No module named requests in shortcuts

Requested features

8 requests
  • Option to use old keyboard buttons
  • Add openssl support
  • Add libx265 codec for ffmpeg
  • Support telnet command
  • Add possibility to compile from source
Show 3 more
  • Make Ubuntu default
  • Add expansion of keys (e.g., echo {a..z})
  • Adjustable font size

Site Config

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

None

a

No in-app purchases

None

Site Config

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is a free?
a is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Site Config free?
Site Config is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do a or Site Config have ads?
Neither a nor Site Config shows ads.
Which is updated more often, a or Site Config?
a ships an update monthly, and Site Config every 3 days. Most recently, a was updated on October 25, 2026 and Site Config on October 24, 2026.

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