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Random thoughts: Launcher search

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Vurbal:
Today I was working out how to use FARR as a sort of compound replacement for Search and Run in my LBC based Start Menu alternative. Really the only thing I miss about the Start Menu alternatives is the ability to search the Start Menu itself as a shortcut to clicking 2 or 3 times. The extra clicks aren't really a problem with the LBC configuration I created. In fact that was part of the point, but it occurs to me that if you had a launcher with a text-based configuration file (XML ideally) you could do some really cool things by taking advantage of metadata.

The obvious use, like the Start Menu, would be simply finding a program which you could do by name or mouseover hint or executable, or whatever other metadata might be available. That wouldn't necessarily be a huge timesaver except that if you had something like a list of batch files or scripts you use for configuration or maintenance or whatever you could have them at your fingertips whenever you wanted.

Or maybe you might want to use FARR to bring up an entire menu rather than an individual item. Depending on what (and how much) metadata was in your configuration file you could perhaps even assemble a list from multiple menus so you don't have to track down each one individually.

Obviously LBC isn't currently setup for that kind of access but it would be an interesting idea. And of course you would have the flexibility to use some other launcher entirely instead of the 2 components being integrated together.

Sadly I'm a long way from being a programmer and not the kind of person likely to finish a project like this. Things like this just pop into my head and I'm compelled to see where they lead.

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