[Macworld]

Post your comments for Launchpad-Control 1.3 here

[brobdingnagian]

Why does it earn just 3.5 mice?

[mfogler]

Just don't use launchpad.

[Dan Frakes]

brobdingnagian, on 23 August 2011 - 10:34 AM, said:

Why does it earn just 3.5 mice?

3.5 mice = Good/Very Good. And it's a Mac Gem.

It didn't earn an even higher rating because of some of the limitations mentioned in the review.

[whitedog]

LaunchPad Control has gotten better in a short period of time. You can now access folders with "flippy" arrows, making it much easier to visualize LaunchPad's organization. And the LPC icon has been improved, too. I suspect the author will be adding features in the near future. It's one of those apps that makes you think, "why didn't Apple think of that?"

This post has been edited by whitedog: 23 August 2011 - 11:03 AM

[flybynight]

I just made a folder called "Crap I Never Use" and put it by itself on the last page.

[craigduck]

Cool utility, but I don't understand why anyone uses Launch Pad on their Mac anyway.
To quickly launch an application or a file associated with an application
press apple (command) and spacebar at the same time.
This opens the Spotlight search window. Type the first few letters of the app or document you want to use and BINGO, you are working again much more quickly then you can using Launchpad or the menu / program icons.

[Octavian]

Quote

one of Lion’s worst features

Please, stop imposing your opinion on others in every single article. To some, LaunchPad is one of the best features in Lion. I, personally, find it the most useful one. If you don't like it just because you have so much crap installed you never use, it's not LaunchPad's fault. Just delete all the useless apps.

Sure, it could definitely use some improvements like bulk grouping and hiding. And the annoying auto-rearrange bug definitely should be fixed ASAP. But even with all those flaws, I still find it very useful. I've stopped launching apps from Spotlight or Finder since the first hour of using LaunchPad.

This post has been edited by Octavian: 23 August 2011 - 11:16 AM

[tony_d]

Just not getting LaunchPad. It makes my desktop look like a Windows machine (never liked all those icons on Window's desktops). How is using LaunchPad any different than the Application Folder set on icon view? Keyboard shortcut maybe, but there is one is one already: Shift-Command-A

[Randmlyorganizd2988]

It comes back to haunt you. I haven't figured out why, but LP repopulates. And then you have to go through and turn them back off.

[Voe]

mfogler, on 23 August 2011 - 10:42 AM, said:

Just don't use launchpad.

I'll second that, and third and fourth it. Launchpad brings nothing to the party.

There are probably more things under the hood in Lion which are more useful, Spotlight seems to be more functional and so on, but the bugs are still annoying, such as freezing after sleeping, the fact that a two finger tap does not emulate the ctrl button to bring up contextual menus but brings up Dashboard, even after update to 10.7.1, and some url's still stick forever, some never even load, be that in Safari or Firefox or whatever.

That's my short (gripe) list on a MBP, I'll passé on the grey woven startup screen, the diarrheic Address Book and iCal, so called leather appearance. Each user will have his own tale of woes.

I realize that Lion has benefitted from many tweaks but from the visual and usage viewpoint, not sure that it adds much relative to Snow Leopard. Hope the next update will help show us why we paid for an update.

[BoxOfSnoo]

I would also need a simple & logical way to sort and organize icons before I touched Launchpad.

[pubb]

I will check this out, but I have a pretty simple system for keeping Launchpad tidy even with several dozen apps. It took a while to get it organized, but I don't have to put any more effort it into it now...

I got everything pared down to two pages by collapsing utilities and rarely used apps into folders. The first page is the real launchpad, the second is just a closet to hide all those apps cluttering things up.

If an app is one I use VERY frequently, its in the dock or auto-starts on login (I'm looking at you Mail). Those apps are on the second page, ordered by name.

If the app is used frequently, it goes on the first page, ordered by name. A quick claw-like motion on the trackpad and my frequently used apps are ready and waiting.

One feature I would really like to see is the ability to alter the spacing between icons. On my 13" MBP, I get 8 columns of 5 rows (don't know if this varies on other size displays) and there are a LOT of wasted pixels.

[Octavian]

tony_d, on 23 August 2011 - 11:19 AM, said:

Just not getting LaunchPad. It makes my desktop look like a Windows machine (never liked all those icons on Window's desktops). How is using LaunchPad any different than the Application Folder set on icon view? Keyboard shortcut maybe, but there is one is one already: Shift-Command-A

In order to use Cmd+Shift+A shortcut, you first need to make Finder active. And it won't be fullscreen. But with LaunchPad, you can assign it to, let's say, F5 and access your apps no matter which app is active.
But when LaunchPad really shines is when you use a multi-touch trackpad (or at least, a Magic Mouse). You can can pinch with 3 fingers to open LaunchPad and easily swipe between LaunchPad screens with 2 fingers. Not to mention, that Mission Control as well becomes so much easier to work with when you have a multi-touch trackpad.

pubb, on 23 August 2011 - 11:55 AM, said:

One feature I would really like to see is the ability to alter the spacing between icons. On my 13" MBP, I get 8 columns of 5 rows (don't know if this varies on other size displays) and there are a LOT of wasted pixels.

Nope, 8x5 on a 27" iMac as well.

This post has been edited by Octavian: 23 August 2011 - 12:46 PM