Radian: The Radial Circular Launcher

 Software Reviews  1 Response »
Nov 192009
 

Radian is described by its author as

Radian is a simple radial application launcher


Radian

When Radian is launched it starts with what it calls design mode, which is also accessible any time by right clicking or double clicking its system tray icon. This startup briefly slows the system while the program searches and indexes its pre-configured shortcuts, described below. In design mode Radian’s circular or radial interface is divided into 4 quadrants (see image). Each quadrant can be configured, using its corresponding wheel icon residing near the center of the circle, to hold chosen shortcuts and their respective icons. Three of the four quadrants are pre-configured to show desktop items, quick launch items and the recent documents entries. The fourth quadrant is called custom and any file or shortcut can be dragged to any of its regions. Right clicking on any of the individual regions also allows for the creation of custom shortcuts.

After design mode is done Radian stays in the tray and can be activated by clicking and holding down the right click button any where on the screen. Then the second, third or  fourth quadrants can then be made visible by moving the mouse in a circular fashion while still holding down the right click button.

Radian is one launcher that certainly needs getting used to but it is a different and original looking download.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , , ,

StartUp Is A Launcher…And An AppManager?

 Software Reviews  No Responses »
Nov 102009
 

StartUp is described by its author as

WPF tool to help you launch your programs easily.

To start off the developer page does not mention the name ‘StartUp’. The only place this program’s name is visible is in the solitary screenshot. One can easily confuse its name to be ‘AppManager’ as that is the domain URL and also the title of page. That minor quibble aside, on to the program itself.


StartUp
Upon installation StartUp looks up or indexes the system’s start menu, quick launch and recent documents entries and presents them in a rectangular interface (see image) and also groups them into areas. Right clicking anywhere on the program window or clicking the + icon one can create groups for additional shortcuts. The program supports dragging and dropping shortcuts, executables or almost any file to create links to them. It is also possible to drag a file over a program icon, while holding the Alt key, to force the file to be opened with that particular program.
The program is minimized to the system tray using its X or close icon or by just pressing the Esc key. By default the program window can be maximized by using the Alt and ~ keys or by what it calls “mouse activation”. To activate the program using the mouse single click the top left hand edge of the screen. This activation feature can be turned off using the program’s preferences.
Perhaps the best part of StartUp is the integrated search feature. Click anywhere on the program interface and just start typing, a search box narrows your choices as you type (see image).
StartUp requires, at a minimum, the .NET 3.0 framework and is a 164KB download. It is released under the Microsoft Public License.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , , ,

Speed Launch From Microsoft Office Labs Is An Interesting Launcher

 Software Reviews  No Responses »
Sep 302009
 

Speed Launch is created by Microsoft’s Office Labs. The office labs is one experimental arm of Microsoft that is sometimes not too busy on the public side and develops products that one may not necessarily associate with the company. Speed Launch is perhaps one such example and is a program that has many other freeware equivalents.
Speed Launch
Upon installation Speed Launch places a bulls eye looking icon on the desktop that stays on top of all windows but dims to stay as unobtrusive as possible. Using the win + c keys the program pops up a set of what it calls functions. The set of built-in functions can be activated by clicking on them. They allow for such things as searching for weather forecasts and wikipedia pages.
Being a launcher Speed Launch has an interesting way to make routine tasks easier. Dragging and dropping any shortcut, file or site favicon into the bulls eye allows the user to associate an intuitive keyword with it and to later use it to open the same program, document or website. Keywords can also be added manually via the program’s ‘Add Shortcuts’ menu (by right clicking on the bulls eye).
Speed Launch also supports more advanced functions. These are the equivalent of launching a program or website – that has a shortcut created in Speed Launch – with parameters. One example used in the video on the program’s website shows how by choosing a keyword followed by “.” (dot without quotes) one can make a function that loads a map of a certain location without the need to enter the map’s homepage and then typing the desired location. It is therefore and like any other program launcher a way to save time and key strokes. Another interesting feature built-in is what is called the MegaSearch. Typing megaseach. and a search term launches the query in bing.com, yahoo.com and google.com. Again something not readily associated with Microsoft of the past.
Office Labs calls Speed Launch a ‘prototype’ and requires the user to allow anonymous usage feedback, however I am not certain if this program is being very actively developed as it is termed a grassroots project that is a ‘direct result of employee initiative’.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , ,

Nexus Is A Fast Dock Launcher

 Software Reviews  1 Response »
Jun 222009
 

Nexus, from the makers of the Winstep desktop enhancement package, is a standalone dock launcher that is otherwise also part of the aforementioned shareware package. This is a true dock in competition with RocketDock and ObjectDock. It is attractive but lightweight and fast.

Going through the settings or preferences, accessible most easily by right clicking the Nexus icon that is part of the default dock or by right clicking on the tray icon itself, is the way to discover its many features. Adding program shortcuts to the dock is done in two ways. The more difficult way is to right click anywhere on the dock and choose ‘Insert New Dock Item’. Doing it this way requires choosing a label, finding the item or program by browsing and more. The slightly easier way is to drag the program’s icon to the dock where it can be added automatically. In both cases a hot key can be added by choosing combinations of Ctrl, Shift and Alt keys or mouse actions or gestures such as ‘bumping’ corners of the screen.


Nexus

Getting back to the program’s options and preferences, there are many possibilities for making an attractive and useful dock. The Position & Behavior tab has settings for the screen position of the dock, offset pixels from any of the set (top, center, etc.) positions, behavior relating to multi-monitor set ups, auto hide options and whether the dock reserves its place on screen or allows windows to open on top of it or permanently stays on top. The Appearance tab controls the size of the dock icons and transparency and reflection of the dock and icons respectively. The Effects tab is the place to change the effects (obviously) of the icons when they are clicked. Themes is where the shape of the dock as a whole is chosen and the default install includes choices that make its background transparent. Tasks, among others, has such settings as ‘Show running applications in this dock’ and ‘Would you like to group windows that belong to the same application in a single icon or next to each other?’. Therefore the tasks setting can dramatically increase the size of the dock but provide easy access to all open windows. Sounds adds sounds (obviously again) to many and all actions associated with the program including a talking clock. The General tab is to control such things as the auto-hide settings, Windows Start up behavior and others such as leaving the program icon in the tray area and whether to launch programs within the dock with a single or double click. Advanced tries to help the user in balancing performance and speed, troubleshoot, back up and restore dock configurations and more.

As seen in the image I have added the stacks from Standalonestack, featured here on RGdot, on to the Nexus dock. In my opinion this works well in terms of efficiency, productivity and even eye candy.

Nexus runs on virtually all versions of Windows including its 64 bit flavors and Windows 7.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , ,

Use StandaloneStack To Access Files And Folders

 Software Reviews  5 Responses »
Jun 202009
 

StandaloneStack is an attractive and useful way of accessing files and folders from any location.

StandaloneStack
The main use of StandaloneStack is to place a shortcut of sorts on the desktop that acts as a launcher. Only in this case StandaloneStack as it is is not a dock like ObjectDock from StarDock or perhaps the more famous RocketDock. Here a ‘stack’ is created and provides some eye candy and navigation without a dock.

Once downloaded and unzipped one can create a new stack by simply clicking ‘New Stack’. Choose a name and browse to the folder which will be the target of the stack and opened when clicking on the stack icon. Then choose it’s shape and direction. The shape can be in the form of accordion like collection of icons or a rectangular grid (as shown in the image). The sorting can be set here as well plus the option to add an icon to open the folder in the usual way via Windows Explorer.

StandaloneStack
Some of the more interesting ‘General Settings’ consist of the following. It is possible to animate video icons, meaning that if a video resides in one of the stacked folders the icon will be dynamic and change. Custom icons are supported when checking the corresponding option and placing the icons or images in the Images folder inside the program folder. By checking the option to ‘Don’t Close Stack On Focus Lost (Run Shortcut Again To close)’ one can keep the stack open since by default the stack collapses after losing focus like when a file is launched. Icon size, text spacing, color and font are configurable for the fan or accordion and grid styles as well as the transparency and color of the text and stack background itself.

But perhaps most importantly is the fact that one can navigate within stacks. Clicking on a folder opens the sub folder using the same stack style with an additional icon to go back.

Follow its development on the Aqua-Soft forums where you can find many interesting utilities and related discussions.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , , ,

Hawkscope Is A Cross Platform Launcher

 Software Reviews  No Responses »
Jun 122009
 

Hawkscope is described by its author as

Hawkscope is a productivity tool that allows you to access your hard drive contents quickly via system tray / menubar icon with dynamic pop-up menu

The main feature and usefulness of Hawkscope is that it provides a dynamic menu that pops up anywhere on the desktop by way of a configurable hot key. The same can be done by clicking on the program icon in the tray area. The Quick Access tab of the settings lets folders be chosen that will appear above the default local drive navigation built in. The Blacklist is somewhat an interesting and rare feature in that certain folders can be configured or added to the list to remain hidden and not show up when navigating using Hawkscope. The Network tab lets the user configure a proxy server to use when invoking the plugins that require internet access.
Hawkscope
The available plugins are few as of this article and some are of limited value. For example the Googlescope plugin opens an ‘Input Dialog’ box that then in turns opens the system’s default browser to search google for the term(s) entered. As far as productivity and number of clicks little is gained but other plugins that exist now and in the future may prove more useful. The final tab in the settings is the Open With one and here programs can be chosen for opening directories (perhaps a windows explorer alternative) and unknown files (perhaps a text editor) by double clicking in the corresponding text box. Additionally file extensions can be associated with programs so that using Hawkscope one can override the default applications that open .txt, .html or any other file.

Hawkscope is cross platform and is certainly promising. With more plugins and slightly better memory usage – up to 60MB on a XP SP3 system – it has potential for efficiency and productivity users.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , , ,

SysPad Is A Simple Folder And Notepad Utility

 Software Reviews  4 Responses »
Jun 072009
 

SysPad is a utility from CodePlex, it is described simply as

A Notepad-like program and folder management program

Syspad is only 570KB but sometimes consumes a bit more than expected memory, approaching 40MB, but nevertheless provides easy access to two useful functions for the efficient user. Installation adds an icon to the tray bar. Thereafter a right click launches a tabbed notepad and a left click launches a favorites folder manager.

SysPad

The notepad (called TrayPad) is simple, allows for the typical background and font control. Notes can be saved in .txt format. There is an option to export and open the note using the famous and highly rated Notepad ++ – with syntax highlighting preset from within SysPad -  but in my test I was unable to launch Notepad++ after doing the required to set the path to the program within Syspad’s settings (Edit—>Settings).

The file manager (called FolderPad) has preset icons to common folders and locations including My Computer, My Documents, Desktop, Control Panel, Program Files, Add/Remove Programs, Network Properties, plus the Printers and Font folders. Right clicking in the white area presents a dialog to add one’s own favorite folders either via browsing or manually typing a location. A tag or title can be added to server as a description as well.

SysPad while certainly not unique or feature rich is useful and is another download that works well to add some level of efficiency for any computer user. Interestingly since both right and left clicks are used to launch the note and folder utilities there is no way to shut down and completely exit the program via the computer’s tray area. The only way seems to be to have the notes or TrayPad portion open and use File—>Exit Syspad.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , , ,

Appetizer Is Food For Your Application Launching Needs

 Software Reviews  No Responses »
May 212009
 

Appetizer is described by its author as

…a free application launcher, or dock, for Windows

Appetizer is an open source entry in the application launcher list that includes the likes of 8Start, reviewed here previously, LaunchBar Commander from DonationCoder and many others. It is available in an executable and ZIP package portable. It also supports skins and plugins.

Appetizer
Appetizer, as it stands now at version1.3, keeps it simple. The first step in using it can be importing Start Menu and Quick Launch shortcuts using a special importer. Alternatively one can click on the + button (see image, showing Appetizer using the iAppetizer skin) or drag and drop program icons into the dock to create shortcut items manually. By right clicking shortcuts one can change the display name of the shortcut, change its path and icon and add special parameters that control how the application is launched. In addition to the aforementioned shortcuts can be added to ‘multi-launch’ groups. A multi-launch is often useful when one wants to open several portable applications (non-portable ones too) by clicking one single button. Here, using Appetizer, one can add many shortcuts to a group and open several applications simultaneously.

The configuration menu of Appetizer lets the user do the following: choose its language (18 available as of this review), keep the app on top, check for updates, change its skin, its orientation (vertical or horizontal), its icon size, its transparency, auto hide it after an application launch, run multi-launch groups on start up, add a hot key to hide/show the dock and enable/disable plugins. One of the useful included plugins is the one that opens the folder where the application being launched resides in. Once enabled a plugin becomes accessible via a right click on any of the shortcuts.
Appetizer is a very promising relatively new software and runs on Windows 2000, XP and Vista.

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , , , , ,

8start Launcher

 Software Reviews  2 Responses »
Dec 232008
 

8start is decribed by its author as

A free Application Launcher to make your desktop clean, with Tree Notes feature to keep and share your notes fast and easy. Portable, skinable, customizable, innovation…

Using it you can keep notes in trees with additional features recently added like tree shortcuts and favorites. One can customize skins and backgrounds or download a few more available on the developer’s forum. Most importantly one can make rows and rows of shortcuts to launch application, documents and sites and divide them all into categories. On a XP system tested and used for months it has never surpassed 10MB usage and can be made portable as well. The tiny graph to monitor drive space is a useful little tool too.

Take a look at screenshots and a more thorough explanation of 8start’s features. It is free for any use and can be downloaded from here

 Posted by RG  Tagged with: , ,
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