223 - [FS] LaunchBar 5 - Part 1 [Free Show]

It's no secret that LaunchBar has been one of my favourite applications, probably from since I first started on the Mac. At it's core, LaunchBar is an application launcher but to call it just an application launcher does it a disservice. Objective Developments, the developers of LaunchBar have been increasing the functionality with each release, adding not just cool but stunningly useful features. The bottom line is that the application very quickly becomes an indispensable tool once you've started using it for even just a few hours.

LaunchBar 5 creates an index of all the "stuff" on your Mac - Applications, files, folders, documents, preference panes, web bookmarks, Web history, your iTunes library, your address book, your iPhoto library and much more. It allows you to create abbreviations to search and access all this "stuff" without moving your hands from the keyboard, making it so much more efficient that picking up your mouse and clicking all over the screen. Add in some extra features such as the built in actions and my favourite - integration with webs services and web search templates, you'll wonder how you ever did without it

Although I've explored LaunchBar before in previous shows, for this show I thought I'd start from scratch, so you don't need to dig out the old shows.

In this week's show I cover:

Introduction & Installation
Initial Configuration
LaunchBar 5 Basics
Launching Applications
Instant Open
Opening Recent Documents
Using Address Book Data in LB5
Skype Integration
Working with Files in LB5
Accessing Websites via LB5
Using Web Search Templates
Searching and Accessing Bookmarks & Web History

The next free show will take a look at some of the other new features of LaunchBar 5