Free LaunchBar Actions for Controlling Hook

LaunchBar by Objective Development and Hook are two complementary information retrieval apps. LaunchBar provides context-free information retrieval (searched based), Hook is specialized for linking and context-sensitive information retrieval (link-based). Hook’s search feature finds what you have bookmarked. LaunchBar is, in addition, a “Swiss army knife” with many other functions.

You can use Hook and LaunchBar together in several ways, one of which is to see everything you’ve linked with Hook. Hook creates bookmarks when you hook items together or use Copy Link on files. First, you need to download a free LaunchBar action we have created for you. This one is for Hook 1.8 and This one is for Hook 2.0. Then, double-click on the “Show Hook Bookmarks.lbaction” file. That will install it in LaunchBar.

Now, to see all your Hook bookmarks in LaunchBar

  1. Invoke LaunchBar.
  2. Start typing Browse Hook Bookmarks.
  3. Hit the return key.

To find a particular item you’ve linked in Hook. Just type the name of the item. It does not need to be something that LaunchBar indexed independently of Hook.

You can use LaunchBar’s fantastic adaptive search algorithm in steps 2 and 4:

  • In step 2, you don’t need to type all of Browse Hook Bookmarks of course. LaunchBar will quickly show you the right command. You could type “hkb” for “Hook bookmarks”.
  • In step 4, you can type ahead in the way you normally would in LaunchBar, skipping characters.

Screencast and blog post about Hook and LaunchBar

See this blog post and screencast. It describes Four Ways to Use LaunchBar and Hook Together, including using LaunchBar to search for Hook bookmarks.

See also this Hook productivity forum post about LaunchBar integration and Hook automation.

Please note that the “Send to” feature only works with files. You can’t send Safari bookmarks, contacts or other types of info to Hook via LaunchBar at this point.

And more

LaunchBar enthusiasts can already create their own LaunchBar actions based on Hook’s AppleScript dictionary.

Stay tuned for more Hook automation and LaunchBar actions.