DonationCoder.com Software > Find And Run Robot

Launching URL files stored in the Windows file system

(1/6) > >>

mostlytyping:
I'm experimenting with storing bookmarks in folders and using FARR to access the bookmarks rather than browser menus and toolbars. Recently I changed from Firefox to Chrome and I'm finding it a problem because Chrome has very limited support for multi-row bookmark tool bars. As I find using FARR to be quicker than using the mouse, it would seem sensible to rejig my system so that it is not dependent on the particular browser I'm using at any one time.

What I had in mind was a base directory such as "C:\FARR\URLs" containing subfolders such as "news". The subfolders contain actual .URL files, saved in the file system itself. "Google News.URL", for example, consists of the following:
[InternetShortcut]
URL=https://news.google.co.uk/
IDList=
HotKey=0
IconFile=C:\Users\xxxx\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\nrl83w0q.default\shortcutCache\GdUdndw+OdsSTiNrtiv9oA==.ico
IconIndex=0

So far, I have a search folder set up with "C:\FARR\URLs" as the path to be searched and (because FARR seemed to be searching in other areas as well) "+C:\FARR\URLs" in the restrictions box below. Finally I have an entry "uu uu = +uu" in the Quick Search Words box.

This has all been a bit complex, and it's still not working quite as I would like. For instance, if I enter "uu news" FARR shows me a couple of the URL files from the "news" subfolder but it also shows as the first choice the built-in "news" alias as well as a "newegg" alias that is also apparently built-in. At the end of this list of five items it also shows the "news" subfolder, but if I select this it simply opens that subfolder in Explorer.

What I would like FARR to do is show me (in a FARR list) the contents of the "news" subfolder straight away when I type "uu news" and the contents of other subfolders in the URL directory when I type e.g. "uu sport" and so on.

Can anybody give me some pointers as to how I should achieve this?

Thanks

mouser:
Let's see.. ok there are a few ways to do this.. And ironically there are a few others on the forum who are better at using FARR than me for these things :)

Let me assume your quick search words doesn't exist because that confuses me :)

So in your directory entry for "C:\FARR\URLs" if you put into "Optional Modifier Keywords": us

Then if you search for: +us news
It should ONLY search that folder for files matching the term new and should not search any other directories at all.


But you say you want it to show the entire contents of that directory when you search with no keywords, so instead what you could do is make an alias and use the restartsearch function to have it do a directory browsing/filtering.
For that you would make an alias regex trigger like us(.*)
and have result of "restartsearch C:\FARR\URLs $$1"
that should show the contents of the directory when you type us and then progressively filter it as you type keywords, the same as if you had directly typed in: C:\FARR\URLs EXTRA_KEYWORDS_HERE


Having said all that, another possibly MUCH EASIER way to do what you want is not to make separate shortcut files, but make one test file with all the urls you want, and put it in a text file and create a "us" alias that uses the "filecontents" command to let farr search it.

mostlytyping:
Thank you for your helpful advice.

First, the reason I want to use shortcut files is that I can simply drag and drop my bookmarks out of Firefox and into the folder to create them. That's a lot less work than making individual entries in a text file. Having said that, I have investigated the filecontents command and it does work well. It's just a lot more time to set up.

On the subject of using an alias regex trigger, I cannot get it to work as you say should work.

Typing "C:\Farr\URLs extra_keywords_here", such as "C:\Farr\URLs Emacs" does work as we would expect - additional keywords filter down the results and no results from other folders are included. So far, so reassuring.

However, when I use the us(.*) approach it does not have the same effect, instead returning all kinds of files that are not related to the folder in question. My assumption is that I have set it up wrong, but looking at the following dialog I can't see what the problem is!

Launching URL files stored in the Windows file system

mouser:
You did exactly what I said do to but I mispoke -- the function you want to use is "dosearch" not "restartsearch".

It's dosearch that will do the live display and filtering as you type.
The function restartsearch only triggers when you hit enter.

mostlytyping:
Thank you for that amendment. I have looked at the docs and that seems reasonable.
Unfortunately doesn't seem to make any difference. Here's the configured screen:

Launching URL files stored in the Windows file system

Here is the output if I use a direct reference to the path, which is exactly as I would expect - I get results only from that folder and its subfolders:

Launching URL files stored in the Windows file system

And here is the output using that alias, which is not as I would expect - it includes results from everywhere and the hits from the folder in question are not even visible:

Launching URL files stored in the Windows file system

So something is still wrong, but I can't see what it is.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page