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What happened to the Launcher?

mathwhiz90601

mathwhiz90601

macrumors 6502
Original poster
I love Launcher from Mac OS 9. What has replaced it in OS X? If nothing, is there another program that has the same functionality?

note: Launcher captured from SheepShaver. My REAL mac's launcher has subfolder buttons at the top for different categories of programs. But I can't screen capture on that computer.
 

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You could make folders for different apps, drag aliases of the different apps into them and place the folders in the dock, next to the wastebasket. Ctrl/right-clicking the folders would give you a list of its content.

You can also drag aliases directly into the folders while in the dock.

[Edit] Example:
 

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This is one of the strangest things I have seen.

Many more people probably use the Dock is Mac OS X than those who even knew about, yet alone used the Launcher.
 
Belly-laughs said:
You could make folders for different apps, drag aliases of the different apps into them and place the folders in the dock, next to the wastebasket. Ctrl/right-clicking the folders would give you a list of its content.

You can also drag aliases directly into the folders while in the dock.
Click to expand...

Thank you! That's cool. I can't wait.

elppa said:
This is one of the strangest things I have seen.

Many more people probably use the Dock is Mac OS X than those who even knew about, yet alone used the Launcher.
Click to expand...

Well, I got my iMac at the very tail end of the Mac OS 9 era. Didn't have the HDD space to get Mac OS X on that machine. Didn't have the finances to do much more to it other than upgrade the RAM and the mouse.

Until now. Now I'm going to get my first OS X computer next week after the new iMacs are released. 🙂

Long time Mac user, First time Mac OS X user.
 
Man, you´ve been patient! But we´ll all be envious come Tuesday!

One more tip: Like in OS 9 you can change the appearance of folders to make their content more obvious.

And… there´s always Quicksilver.
 
mathwhiz90601 said:
Thank you! That's cool. I can't wait.



Well, I got my iMac at the very tail end of the Mac OS 9 era. Didn't have the HDD space to get Mac OS X on that machine. Didn't have the finances to do much more to it other than upgrade the RAM and the mouse.

Until now. Now I'm going to get my first OS X computer next week after the new iMacs are released. 🙂

Long time Mac user, First time Mac OS X user.
Click to expand...

Please don't take offence, I didn't mean to sound rude and I apologise if it came across that way.

Once you get your new computer (lucky!) you will see just how the Dock makes the launcher an irrelevance, only it's more useful than the launcher and this will continue in leopard.

I went from a iMac 266 ==> Black MacBook Core Duo so I have some idea of having to wait and extended period… I did take the RAM to 288 MB and it was running 10.3, despite being rather sluggish (depended on the app) it was more reliable than an OS 9 machine.

Which iMac do you have? (Edit: Just seen, it's in your sig.)
 
The Dock is very cool, and is definitely a good Launcher replacement, but if you need something better, there are programs out there that fill this need. DragThing has been around since the Mac OS "Classic" days, but that doesn't mean it isn't a Universal Binary or in the process of being made ready for Leopard. I used to use it, then stopped for a while, then only recently rediscovered it. Boy, has it ever changed since I last used it.
 
This thread made me laugh.

My daughter, she was about 5 at the time, used to call the Launcher "Lawn Chair". The first time she asked me if something was in the Lawn Chair it took me about 10 minutes of questioning to finally figure out what she was talking about. We called it "Lawn Chair" until we lost it with OS X.

She's 20 now and still occasionaly refers to the Dock on her MacBook as the Lawn Chair.
 
elppa said:
Please don't take offence, I didn't mean to sound rude and I apologise if it came across that way.

Once you get your new computer (lucky!) you will see just how the Dock makes the launcher an irrelevance, only it's more useful than the launcher and this will continue in leopard.

I went from a iMac 266 ==> Black MacBook Core Duo so I have some idea of having to wait and extended period… I did take the RAM to 288 MB and it was running 10.3, despite being rather sluggish (depended on the app) it was more reliable than an OS 9 machine.
Click to expand...

You didn't come off as offensive. I used to complain loudly about how nobody supported Mac OS 9 anymore, until I realized it would be like using System 7 in 2000. 😱

It still appears from reading these forums that upgrading once in seven years is half the speed of pretty much anyone else. I'm surprised it even lasted this long. I saw somebody say they had to replace their PC's every 12-13 months due to corruption.

Somebody's already told me to go with a refurbished, older model, because I'd wet myself with the speed increase to a new computer. 🙄
 
I used DragThing at work and it was GREAT. We use around three programs ALL the time so we had F keys assigned to those. It was great to be able to go F10 to get back to Safari and then F11 to get back into the program we used for taking orders and then back again. Same with going into mail, or changing an iTunes song and then going back to what you were doing. However, once I got my own Mac I found that the :apple: + Tab was very useful and that I didn't really need to have DragThing since this built in function allows me to scroll through all open applications without barely moving my fingers from the home keys... plus you don't even have to scroll if you're just switching between two programs, since the program you switched away from last is second on the list and just an :apple: + Tab away.
 
Old macs never die...that just get handed down.

My daughters are using 10.3.9 on a 266 Lime iMac (whooping 6GB on HDD)
Just bought my wife a new MacBook so my daughters are using herr old G3 iBook as well. 🙂
 
aspro said:
I salute you and your incredible patience, I am so pathetic with new technology the longest I have ever been able to hold out is two years between computers!
Click to expand...

Cost is an issue... the main breadwinner of the family lost their job in the .com bubble bust. Things are looking more up now.

Second issue is that what I had worked fine for me until a few months ago. Cat spilled my water glass on the keyboard, causing the space bar, return, both shifts, all modifier keys, caps lock, tab, the arrow keys, the enter on the keypad, and half of the rest of the keypad to become NON-FUNCTIONAL. Fortunately, I cobbled together some PC parts to use in the meanwhile for when the new iMacs come. Both old iMac and old PC are 7 years old, though.

Play Ultimate said:
Old macs never die...that just get handed down.

My daughters are using 10.3.9 on a 266 Lime iMac (whooping 6GB on HDD)
Just bought my wife a new MacBook so my daughters are using herr old G3 iBook as well. 🙂
Click to expand...

Wow, that means my 350 teal (blueberry or bondi?) iMac is better than yours! But it runs 9.2.2 . Hmmm.... if I installed panther on it and got a new keyboard, my mother could use it....
 
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