- #Alfred app vs launchbar generator
- #Alfred app vs launchbar software
- #Alfred app vs launchbar code
- #Alfred app vs launchbar mac
#Alfred app vs launchbar mac
Another old favourite of long-time Mac users is Butler, from Many Tricks. There are die-hards still using the OG launcher, Quicksilver, and given it is open source and free, for some it remains worth a look. These are not the only two apps of this kind, of course. As a bonus, they can manage the simple things too, I even lock, logoff and shutdown my Mac with Alfred – and Alfred also has an iOS remote app that allows me to control my Mac from my iPhone or iPad. Anything that you can automate via scripting can be triggered via a launcher like Alfred or LaunchBar, which means they capable of all kinds of complicated tasks. There is a built-in clipboard manager, and text-expander style snippet function. Alfred is an onion, and in reality I have barely peeled back the first layer.
Searching my Papers library, converting documents with Pandoc, searching my Pinboard bookmarks, making currency conversions, task management input, natural-language entry of calendar events, time-stamping notes, Image Optimisation, file management. The screenshot of my workflows is only part of the picture.
Both the official site and forum, and the unofficial Packal site, are loaded with workflows, advice and friendly automation ninjas willing to help you down a rabbit hole, or back out of one.Īgain, I use Alfred for all kinds of things. Other than that admittedly abstract and vague selection criteria, it is fair to say the user community around Alfred appears much more engaged and accessible. It is difficult to say how one might choose between them, but you may find the keystrokes for one, or the other, more intuitive for the way you work. As far as which launcher is the best? That honestly depends on who you talk to, but there seems to be a fairly solid consensus that the contenders are LaunchBar, and my personal favourite Alfred.īoth LaunchBar and Alfred are limitlessly extensible LaunchBar with Actions and Alfred with Workflows. Going beyond Spotlight to incorporate automation is where the best third-party launchers excel. What’s more, Spotlight comes baked right into macOS, so a lot of people will find that hitting command (⌘) space will allow you to do a lot more with the keyboard than you realised. Spotlight has developed well beyond its basic search capabilities in the past few years to the point where, although still relatively basic, it is much more than a mere search engine and application launcher nowadays. If you want to keep your hands on the keyboard, then using a launcher is essential.
#Alfred app vs launchbar generator
To get you started with customization, check out Brett Terpstra’s Popclip Extension Generator Alfred, Launchbar and others (…but mostly Alfred)Ī lot of Mac nerds would argue that a Launcher is the purist’s starting point for workflow automation.
#Alfred app vs launchbar code
Not only will a Github search reveal many more ingenious uses for Popclip, and you can even code your own. This link will take you to the pre-packaged extensions that are available, but the good news doesn’t end there. I use it for text transformations, Shortening URLs, dictionary and thesaurus lookups, adding tasks to my task manager, adding links to Pinboard or Instapaper, adding references to Papers, translations, and the list just keeps going. I have become so used to using it that if ever I’m on a Mac without it I get a little lost. Popclip takes that idea, brings it to the Mac, and makes it extensible with customizable actions. The need to port contextual functionality such as copy and paste to the iPhone and iPad led to the creation of the ubiquitous black speech-bubble that appears from a long press on those devices. We have always had the right-click context menu to access functionality in OS X or macOS, but Popclip brings an interpretation of the context menu from iOS back to the Mac. Popclip is one of those apps that highlights a gap in design reciprocity between iOS and macOS.
#Alfred app vs launchbar software
As with all such suggestions, the limit to what you can do with this kind of software will be somewhere between what you can dream up, and how much time you are willing (or able) to sink into them. These tools have both explicit and implicit utility for study, research, or indeed any academic related workflows. To be fair, at least one of the areas I cover this time around is likewise pretty well known, but I also want to highlight a couple of unique utilities that qualify as automation tools. Picking up where I left off with the first Mac automation post we covered some of the more well known Automation utilities on macOS in Text Expander, Automator, and Hazel.
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