Even in its alpha stage of growth, Ubiquity has demonstrated itself as a powerful extension to Firefox search and navigation, but it has one obvious limitation: its scope is limited to Firefox. It would be nice to have identical functionality offline, at the operating system level.
Enter Enso Launcher, the offline equivalent of Ubiquity. Like Ubiquity, a hotkey evokes a translucent console window allowing you to launch apps or perform seaches. Enso is actually Ubiquity’s antecedent, authored by the developers at Humanized, a software company that was acquired earlier this year by the Mozilla Foundation.
Despite having more than a year’s development lead on Ubiquity, Enso has matured at a slower rate, having been open-sourced late in life. Where Ubiquity commands for web services and mashups are added through JavaScript, Enso has only recently become extensible through Python scripts, so the current command list is much shorter. Let’s take a closer look.
Preparing Enso for action
Once you download and install Enso from Humanized’s site, the first thing you’ll probably want to do is change the default hotkey behavior. Enso is set to work by holding down the Caps Lock key while you enter your command, which is awkward — especially if the command involves letters habitually keyed by the left hand. This “quasimodal” default is the mode that Enso’s developers recommend persisting with and getting used to.
I recommend changing it instantly with extreme prejudice. While online, hold down Caps Lock, type preferences. The browser takes you to an Enso help page, from which you configure the launcher’s hotkeys. In the “Select Enso Stickiness” section, change the radio button from “Quasimodal (default)” to “Sticky.” In the “Select Enso Entry Key” section, you can select one of a few alternative hotkeys.
When quasimodal, Enso executes commands on release of the Caps Lock key. In sticky mode, commands are executed on hitting Enter. Enso developers argue that the tactile feedback of engaging the Caps Lock key is a more reliable way for users to know they’re in command mode than the visual feedback of seeing the console window. That may be true, but I’d rather have all of my fingers available to for less self-conscious typing.
In action
To launch as application, simply enter open [application] into Enso. As you type, you’ll see a list of matches below, so if the target application isn’t the default selection, arrow down to it. If you make a mistake and want to exit the command window, you can either hit Esc or follow what you already typed by a nonsense string, like open Internet Exjokajto.
Power users will recognize that launchers like SlickRun and Launchy don’t require preceding the app name with the open keyword. I’ve found that unless I supplement Launchy with assignments from AutoHotkey, I get mixed results. For instance, if I type palm desktop into Launchy, nothing seems to happen — it’s probably launching a component of the Palm Deskop, like HotSync Manager. The open keyword is less efficient but more consistent.
Other actions
Go. This switches to a selected window or tab. As I type this in Q10, I can switch to my open copy of MindManager by typing go mindmanager (or an abbreviated version entry as long as it’s unique, like go mind). Alt-Tab is more efficient when you only have a couple of apps open, but if you have several, go involves less pausing between selections.
Learn as open. If you highlight a file icon, file name or url, entering learn as open [new command name] into Enso associates the new command name for keyboard launching, so if I have, say, a swipefile.txt file that I’ve associated with the name swipe, I can launch the swipe file by entering open swipe into Enso instead of navigating to it from a file manager. You can also unlearn open [command name] to break the command binding or undo unlearn to reinstate it.
Define and Spellcheck. These require Enso Words, a universal dictionary and spellchecker. Naturally, the dictionary’s syntax is define [word]. Enter spellcheck mode by entering spellcheck, and exit using the done keyword. You can either download Words as an addition to Enso Launcher, or download all Enso beta apps in a single package. They all run through the same interface.
Word count. Another command enabled with Enso Words
Google. Search a highlighted word or phrase, or enter google [query] into Enso. The browser is launched if it isn’t already active.
Play and Mute. Available as a separate download, or in the beta bundle, Enso Media Remote Control will control your media player from the keyboard. The syntax is play [keyword] [name], where the keyword can be album, artist, genre, or song; play track launches or resumes the current track; and mute as a standalone command mutes the playback.
Pause, Previous and Next. Entering pause track, previous track and next track work as you would expect.
Volume. Raise or lower the volume with volume up, volume down or volume [level].
Command list. See the full list of available commands by entering command list into Enso. The breadth of the list, displayed from Humanized’s site depends on how many beta “modules” you have installed.
Help. The help [command name] syntax returns an Enso command’s definition from Humanized.com.
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