Shortcat: Spotlight for OS X's UI

http://shortcatapp.com/

by Xyzodiac • 14 years ago

28 12 14 years ago

shortcatapp.com

twe4ked• 14 years ago

“Movement saved: 242,553 pixels”.

_chendo_5• 14 years ago

Hey, I'm the developer behind Shortcat. Feel free to ask me about the app!

rafifyalda2• 14 years ago

Nice work Jack! Going to see if I can work this into my Alfred flow.

Only a small request from me - a smaller menu bar icon and/or an option to hide it altogether (though I'm using Bartender to hide it for now).

_chendo_5• 14 years ago

Thanks!

Right now, I'm working on making it faster and more stable before I move to cosmetics, but if you request it at http://shortcat.userecho.com/ and enough people vote it up, I'll make it a priority :)

Also, is Bartender more stable now? I had issues with it not working well when I first heard about it a few months back.

micheljansen• 14 years ago

This works surprisingly well! I especially like it in apps like Messages and Finder (try holding shift to see the hierarchy of the UI). It's also a good measure of site accessibility when used in the browser. Cool!

_chendo_5• 14 years ago

The Messages app doesn't work too well at the moment due to a weird way they expose the attributes of the conversation list, but I'll be adding a workaround soon.

I'm hoping this app will cause developers to try to make their apps/sites more accessible now that more people benefit from more accessible UIs.

DeepDuh2• 14 years ago

I always thought that one of the main UI advantages of Windows vs. OSX is the keyboard control (at least until Microsoft made it a lot worse with the introduction of the Ribbons). This might be a very cool addition to OSX! Keep at it, this has IMO a potential market similar to better touch tools.

_chendo_5• 14 years ago

Yeah, I never figured out how to navigate around the UI with the keyboard on OSX as well as I did on Windows... I'll be adding faster menu access as well!

DeepDuh2• 14 years ago

Well, because you can't. Mac OS in its essence has traditionally been developed for a Mouse/Keyboard combination - Keyboard only is not regarded as the "Mac way". I'd say that this is actually a pretty good match for Laptops, since the touchpad is very close - as long as the touchpad is good you can work pretty efficiently with this combination. However, on Desktops I've always felt limited by OSX compared to Windows and I think this is because your app is missing ;).

Let's just hope Apple will never shut the doors for Apps like yours. Given their current direction it's not unthinkable unfortunately.

dangson• 14 years ago

This is awesome! I use Vimium, an extension for Chrome that does something similar, but have always wanted to be able to use my keyboard for the entire OS. http://vimium.github.com/

Shortcat: Spotlight for OS X's UI

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