Re: Tool for quick lookups/searches (was Re: What's on your TC bookshelf?)

["Richard G. Combs" <richard -dot- combs -at- voyanttech -dot- com>]

Earlier today, I wrote:

> Allow me to put in a plug for Dave's Quick Search Deskbar
> (http://notesbydave.com/toolbar/doc.htm). <snip>

I've been happily using this tool for about a year (v.2.?), but haven't
checked for updates. While confirming the URL above, I noticed that it's now
at v.3.1.6, so I updated. Wow, there's been a lot of development.

The Deskbar now comes with, not 20 or so, but *hundreds* of search
shortcuts! It took me 20 minutes just to prune out the stuff I'll never use
(an easy, click checkboxes process), like various Bible search sites, the
Dictionnaire Universel Francophone En Ligne, Borland newsgroups, JDK
Javadoc, MSDN, and all but one of a half-dozen WhoIs engines.

That still leaves so many search functions that it replaces half my IE
Favorites. Plus a bunch of new functions -- various converters (temp, ASCII,
decimal, hex, measurements), a lorem ipsum generator, case changer, etc.,
etc.

This little gem illustrates collaborative, open source development at its
best -- a simple, highly-extensible tool extended to a fare-thee-well by
many contributors to serve many needs. Check it out -- once you start using
it, you'll hardly ever open your browser directly again.

[previous disclaimer still applies]

Richard


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Richard G. Combs
Senior Technical Writer
Voyant Technologies, Inc.
richardDOTcombs AT voyanttechDOTcom
303-223-5111
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rgcombs AT freeDASHmarketDOTnet
303-777-0436
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