FARR still best in my testing (one exception)

[wizk11]

Hi,

Over the past three days, I tested ~10 Launchers, and found FARR to be the best. I was surprised by this, and happy to find FARR

To give a specific example of how amazing FARR is:
If a folder is named "Listed Good Apps", all Launchers will find it if you type: 'Listed Good' or 'Listed Apps' or 'Good Apps'.
But FARR is the ONLY one that will find it even if you type in reverse: 'Apps Listed'
I was super impressed by this 

I did find one issue though 
https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=53744.0

[Nod5]

Yeah FARR is still great and has advantages still missing from other launchers.

As you get more into it try out regex aliases which lets you speed up launching of frequently used programs and also allows you to display curated results list.

For example if you use Chrome a lot you can create an alias with the regex pattern ^cc$ and the result dolaunch C:\path\to\chrome.exe
After that just type cc in FARR to immediately open Chrome.

Another example. Create regex alias ^(myproj|mypro|mypr|myp)$ and manually add a list of files and folders that belong to some project that you access often. then start typing "myp" to show those, and only those, results. The more frequently you access some program or set of resources the more convenient it will be to set up short regex aliases for them.

Regex aliases and their various commands can be used for a lot of things, especially if you combine them with some light scripting in AutoHotkey or similar language. Check out some of my older posts in this subforum if you're interested. Here's one example
https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=50576.msg441516#msg441516

[wizk11]

Awesome! So you mean just list all the paths here?
https://i.imgur.com/VoH3bTa.jpg

Looks like I can have a regular text word or phrase as the 'Alias Trigger'. So, is the purpose of using regex is that you can have multiple aliases? Like myproj, mypro, myp in your example.

Btw, do you know how FARR is able to match reverse typed search term 'Apps Listed' to folder "Listed Good Apps"?

Another example. Create regex alias ^(myproj|mypro|mypr|myp)$ and manually add a list of files and folders that belong to some project that you access often. then start typing "myp" to show those, and only those, results. The more frequently you access some program or set of resources the more convenient it will be to set up short regex aliases for them.

[Nod5]

Yes, in the big Results editbox. One path per line. Check the FARR helpfile for details on the syntax for alias lines. You can customize the visible text and add custom icons for example.

regex alias: when your typed search string matches the regex FARR shows *only* the results determined by that alias.

regular string alias: when your typed search matches the regular string FARR *includes* the results from that alias in the results but also includes any other files and folders that matches the typed string.

edit: sorry, that difference is dependent on the checkboxes under "what to do on exact alias match" in the "search behaviour" section of the options. I've had "stop search on regex alias match" there checked for so long that I had forgotten it was an option that could be changed 

Both are useful, depends on what you want to do. If you want to memorize a short phrase like "cc" to open Chrome then a regex alias is best because it will instantly show that single result, or in my example with the command dolaunch above, not even show it but directly open Chrome. Instead of showing Chrome.exe but also other files or folders that contains "cc", for example "abcc.txt".

Using RegEx alias with short phrases like that is a bit similar to setting up hotkeys in Windows itself or other tools to launch programs, for example creating a hotkey Alt+Windows+5 to launch Chrome. But an advantage with FARR short regex aliases is that they can be mnemonic, like "cc" where c is the first letter in Chrome. I at least find it harder to remember complex hotkeys than such short alias strings.

Btw, do you know how FARR is able to match reverse typed search term 'Apps Listed' to folder "Listed Good Apps"?

I don't know how mouser implemented it in the code under the hood, but if you type apps listed FARR searches for files/folders that contain both apps and listed anywhere in the filename. The name for that is non-contiguous word search.

apologies for the many edits here, FARR has a lot of options to explore, as you see 

[Ath]

So you mean just list all the paths here?
https://i.imgur.com/VoH3bTa.jpg

Please attach screenshots to your posts, as those externally hosted files will disappear in weeks/months after posting, so sometime in the (near) future we won't be able to see them anymore

[wizk11]

Thanks for this info. It's really awesome! I'm surprised FARR isn't more well known.

Btw, can you use FARR to do: shutdown, reboot, hibernate?
In my previous launcher, I was used to doing that by just typing those words

Yes, in the big Results editbox. One path per line. Check the FARR helpfile for details on the syntax for alias lines. You can customize the visible text and add custom icons for example.

regex alias: when your typed search string matches the regex FARR shows *only* the results determined by that alias.

regular string alias: when your typed search matches the regular string FARR *includes* the results from that alias in the results but also includes any other files and folders that matches the typed string.

edit: sorry, that difference is dependent on the checkboxes under "what to do on exact alias match" in the "search behaviour" section of the options. I've had "stop search on regex alias match" there checked for so long that I had forgotten it was an option that could be changed 

Both are useful, depends on what you want to do. If you want to memorize a short phrase like "cc" to open Chrome then a regex alias is best because it will instantly show that single result, or in my example with the command dolaunch above, not even show it but directly open Chrome. Instead of showing Chrome.exe but also other files or folders that contains "cc", for example "abcc.txt".

Using RegEx alias with short phrases like that is a bit similar to setting up hotkeys in Windows itself or other tools to launch programs, for example creating a hotkey Alt+Windows+5 to launch Chrome. But an advantage with FARR short regex aliases is that they can be mnemonic, like "cc" where c is the first letter in Chrome. I at least find it harder to remember complex hotkeys than such short alias strings.

Btw, do you know how FARR is able to match reverse typed search term 'Apps Listed' to folder "Listed Good Apps"?

I don't know how mouser implemented it in the code under the hood, but if you type apps listed FARR searches for files/folders that contain both apps and listed anywhere in the filename. The name for that is non-contiguous word search.

apologies for the many edits here, FARR has a lot of options to explore, as you see 

[wizk11]

So you mean just list all the paths here?
https://i.imgur.com/VoH3bTa.jpg

Please attach screenshots to your posts, as those externally hosted files will disappear in weeks/months after posting, so sometime in the (near) future we won't be able to see them anymore

Okay, sure. Just to clarify, do you mean save the screenshot locally and then use the "Attach:" option to upload. Right?

[Nod5]

Btw, can you use FARR to do: shutdown, reboot, hibernate?

FARR doesn't have those commands built in. But you can create aliases for them.
See help section "Special/Virtual Launch Strings/Commands".

With "shellexec" you can do stuff in cmd. For example the shutdown command that is built into Windows.

Alternatively you can make an alias that launches a script file that does some action in a programming language of your choice. AutoHotkey, Python or whatever.

[wizk11]

Well explained

I appreciate your feedback and help. Thanks again!

Btw, can you use FARR to do: shutdown, reboot, hibernate?

FARR doesn't have those commands built in. But you can create aliases for them.
See help section "Special/Virtual Launch Strings/Commands".

With "shellexec" you can do stuff in cmd. For example the shutdown command that is built into Windows.

Alternatively you can make an alias that launches a script file that does some action in a programming language of your choice. AutoHotkey, Python or whatever.

[Ath]

Okay, sure. Just to clarify, do you mean save the screenshot locally and then use the "Attach:" option to upload. Right?

Yes, please.