![]() ![]() ![]() This feature has just gotten smarter too LaunchBar can now actually dive into text documents and display their contents directly in its menus! I have ) For example, if I press Control-Space TE, to get LaunchBar thinking about TextEdit, I can then press Space to see a list of all TextEdit’s recently opened documents – and of course then I can choose one to open, still without using the mouse. (I’ve long been obsessed with this kind of functionality, as in “ Now Menus Reincarnated as Action Menus,”. One of things I love about LaunchBar is that it associates recently opened documents with their applications forgivably but unfortunately, it can do this only with Cocoa applications. For example, Control-Space Command-Shift-V Tab WIKI Return causes “TextEdit” (the contents of the clipboard) to be looked up in Wikipedia in my browser! Well, Instant Send eliminates several of those steps the sequence now goes: select “TextEdit” in my document (and don’t bother to copy it!), press and hold Control-Space (Instant Send to LaunchBar, as text, ready to “send” to another command), and type WIKI and Return. But there’s more: if instead I type Control-SpaceĬommand-Shift-V, LaunchBar accepts “TextEdit” not as a command but as text and if I now press Tab, I can type an abbreviation to determine where to “send” that text. If I then type Command-V (for Paste), I’ve “sent” the word “TextEdit” as a command to LaunchBar, so if I press Return, TextEdit will open. Now I type Control-Space, to get LaunchBar’s attention. For example, in this article, I’ve selected and copied the word “TextEdit”. (This came as a shock to me because I was previously unaware even of ordinary Send note that you must quit and relaunch running applications the very first time you run LaunchBar 4.3 after installation for Instant Send to work.) You can select text in an application and tell LaunchBar to process it how it processes it depends on what you ask LaunchBar to launch. To accompany Instant Open, there is also now Instant Send. By the way, rather than bothering with Apple’s Dock or Command-Tab application switcher, I tend to use LaunchBar even to switch to an application that’s already open, especially because I think of applications in terms of names, not icons. And now you needn’t bother with Return either: in LaunchBar 4.3, I just press Control-Space TE, and continue holding down the final E for a moment to open TextEdit. After two or three uses, when you’re sure that LaunchBar’s first guess will be right, you don’t bother to examine the list. LaunchBar offers a list of possible matches you select the one you like (using the keyboard) and hit Return. So, for example, with my configured hot key and LaunchBar’s learned abbreviations, to open TextEdit, I type Control-Space TE. Thus, in the simplest case, such as opening an application, the sequence goes: (1) Get LaunchBar’s attention, by typing its hot key shortcut (2) type the abbreviation (3) press Return. Thus, with LaunchBar you don’t need to use the mouse, the Finder, or your memory: you don’t need a knowledge of where anything is on your computer (because LaunchBar knows), and you don’t need to memorize your abbreviations (because LaunchBar is intelligent). LaunchBar indexes the contents of your computer, and uses intelligent guesswork and learning to match things instantly to the abbreviation you type. ![]() LaunchBar, as you surely know from our extensive earlier coverage, is a launcher that lets you open things by typing an abbreviation. The purpose of LaunchBar is to increase your productivity the idea is to work through it, not to look at it. LaunchBar, from Objective Development, has just been updated to version 4.3, and I’m in serious trouble. #1668: Updated Rapid Security Responses, OS public betas, screen saver bug fixed, “Red Team Blues” book review.#1669: OS security updates, ambiguity of emoji, small business payments with Melio, Twitter now X.#1670: Arc Web browser hits 1.0 release, “Do You Use It?” polls about Apple features.#1671: Apple Q3 2023 earnings, new Beats headphones and earbuds, Stage Manager adoption rate, do you use Spotlight?.1672: The hidden power of Google Sheets, Launchpad usage levels, Emergency SOS via satellite in the Maui fires, do you use proxy icons?. ![]()
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