While Quicksilver rules supreme as the king of universal access and action applications, what are Linux users supposed to do? Sit back and watch in painful agony as Mac users the world over gloat smugly with their shiny little toys? Hell no! I’m going to tell you about some Quicksilver alternatives (probably not as good though) for Linux. There do exist some alternatives for Windows as well, but that’s not the focus of this article.

**GNOME Do**

[[http://do.davebsd.com/|{{http://floatingsun.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/do.png|GNOME Do}}]]

GNOME Do is a fairly recent entry in this already crowded space. [[http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-778606980239491978&hl=en|Here is a screencast]] that shows Do in action. It is being actively developed (and hopefully that continues!) by [[http://blog.davebsd.com/|David Siegel]], a CS student at UPenn. The interface and features seem to highly inspired by Quicksilver, which I think is a great thing. Now if only it wasn’t so tied into GNOME. See my wish list later in the post.

From the website:

//GNOME Do allows you to quickly search for many objects present in your GNOME desktop environment (applications, Evolution contacts, Firefox bookmarks, files, artists and albums in Rhythmbox, Pidgin buddies) and perform commonly used commands on those objects (Run, Open, Email, Chat, Play, etc.).//

**GNOME Launchbox**

GNOME Launchbox is a slightly older effort (and one of the inspirations for GNOME Do). It was started by some developers at [[http://www.imendio.com/|Imendio]] but seems to have fizzled out after an initial burst of activity. The interface is again very Quicksilver-ish.

From the website:

//Launch Box is generally an application launcher. It’s very influenced by Quicksilver for Mac OSX. Remember that this is only a first release so don’t get your hopes up too much. Launch Box is written for the GNOME 2.10 platform and depends on GTK+ 2.6, evolution-data-server 1.2 and gnome-menus. These are currently hard dependencies but the plan is to split out the backends into different optional backends.//

**Katapult**

[[http://katapult.kde.org|Katapult]] started it’s life as an application on
[[http://kde-apps.org|KDE Apps]] around an year back. Since then it has
shifted it’s home a few times, finally landing up on kde.org as an “official”
project.

[[http://katapult.kde.org/|{{http://floatingsun.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/katapult.png|Katapult}}]]

From the KDE-Apps page:

//Katapult is an application for KDE, written in C++, designed to allow faster access to applications, bookmarks, and other items. It is plugin-based, so it can launch anything that is has a plugin for. Its display is driven by plugins as well, so its appearance is completely customizable. It was inspired by Quicksilver for OS X.//

Of all the applications mentioned thus far, I really only have used Katapult
and that too not a whole lot. But over all my experience has not been that
great. I mean it’s nice as an application launcher (and even then it is
sometimes quite slow), but I didn’t find much use for anything else
(calculator?!). Also, it didn’t play (and I don’t think it still does) well
with Compiz and friends (read ugly display).

**Deskbar Applet**

This is another GNOME centric application, probably the least inspired by
Quicksilver in terms of design and interface. I guess you could say it is more
like Spotlight in some respects.

[[http://raphael.slinckx.net/deskbar/|{{http://floatingsun.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/12/launchbox.png|Deskbar Applet}}]]

From the website:

//The goal of DeskbarApplet is to provide an omnipresent versatile search interface. By typing search terms into the deskbar entry in your panel you are presented with the search results as you type.Seaches are handled by a series of plugins. DeskbarApplet provides a simple interface to manage these plugins to provide you with the search results that fit your needs.//

A new kid on the block, the “KRunner” application in the upcoming KDE4 release promises to be a better replacement for Katapult and the current KDE Run dialog. Unfortunately there is no single web page I can point to, and screenshots are spread all over the place. Besides, it is still very much in development and while I have toyed with it a little bit in my KDE 4 session, I really haven’t used it seriously.

**WISH LIST**

So finally, here is my wish list:

* As with most applications in Linux, there is an initial outburst of applications to satisfy similar needs and user requirements. This confounds a lot of new users. Eventually, over time, one or two applications emerge victorious (there are exceptions, of course) but this is a gradual process of absorption, refinement and elimination. I would really love to see a single (or may be two at most) application combining the best technologies at hand (say GNOME Do, and KDE4 Krunner)
* Imitation is the best form of flattery: Quicksilver has gotten to where it is only with extensive community feedback. The model, plugins and user interface it has is PROVEN to work. Don’t try to reinvent the wheel. Steal concepts where possible and relevant! I can’t wait for the day when I will be able to brag about my increase in productivity because of this! Or be able to operate my entire work flow using a single interface: universal access and control baby! :-)

**KWrite with Inconsolata 11pt, 96 dpi**
{{http://floatingsun.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/screenshot11.png|KWrite Inconsolata 11pt}}

**GEdit with Inconsolata 11pt, 96 dpi**
{{http://floatingsun.net/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/screenshot12.png|GEdit Inconsolata 11pt}}

Dear lazy web, if any of you know how to get KDE and GNOME to render fonts in the same way, please let me know. I have made sure both KDE and GNOME are rendering fonts using the same DPI. I have tried with other fonts as well with similar results. I’ve always had issues with fonts rendering differently in GNOME and KDE, so this really isn’t a distribution specific problem.

**Update (11/01/07 2pm PST)**

Some useful links I discovered after writing this post:
* [[http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.kde.general/15660|font size, dpi and rendering in KDE and GNOME]]
* [[http://scanline.ca/dpi/|X Server DPI]]
* [[http://www.mozilla.org/unix/dpi.html|http://www.mozilla.org/unix/dpi.html]]

> I personally just encourage people to switch to KDE.

> This “users are idiots, and are confused by functionality” mentality of Gnome is a disease. If you think your users are idiots, only idiots will use it. I don’t use Gnome, because in striving to be simple, it has long since reached the point where it simply doesn’t do what I need it to do.

> Please, just tell people to use KDE.