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SaneBar 0.1.1: New Quick Launch feature

1st November 2009

A new version of SaneBar (a nifty Windows utility application developed by, you guessed it, me) was just released today! It brings a new and exciting feature called Quick Launch. It is however completely unlike the quick launch you may all know.

But first, what exactly is SaneBar?

SaneBar is a toolbar that sits at the top of your screen and acts like the title bar of a maximized window, even when the current active window isn't maximized. This means that not only does it refrain from occupying any space you can't use (like the start bar does), but you can also access window features much faster. You can simply throw your mouse to the top right corner and close the active window, regardless of where or how small it is. Same goes for maximizing/restoring, where you can just double click SaneBar anywhere. It doesn't matter if you're playing Foxy Bingo while IMing your friends, or focussed on meeting a deadline at work with your email, word processing and spreadsheet applications open, SaneBar will bring sanity to your desktop. In an increasingly complex world, SaneBar simplifies.

Another useful feature it has is the "hot-zone" in the top left corner – just move your mouse to the top left corner of your screen to reveal your desktop. This is very handy when you find yourself minimizing programs to access shortcuts or files on your desktop often. Throw your mouse to the corner, launch a shortcut, then swoop it to the corner again and all your windows are back! This also works when dragging files, which makes it possible to drag or extract files to your desktop even when your screen is cluttered with windows.

Quick Launch brings the abilility to middle click anywhere on SaneBar, hold the button down, throw your mouse in any of the 8 directions (or just leave it where it is, in the middle) and release the button, thus launching any of your 9 configured applications or files incredibly quickly! Because you don't have to hunt down any tiny icons or shortcuts with your mouse, and instead use a couple of quick hand motions and just a single click, the speed of Quick Launch is unmatched by any other ways of launching apps you may be accustomed to (including the desktop, the quick launch bar or the start menu). If you decide that you don't want to launch any applications, you can right click while holding the middle button and cancel the operation.

This is one of the features that SaneBar is worth using for, was worth making for and I'm very proud of. So grab it already and give it a try!