Wox is a versatile keyboard-based launcher for Windows.
Activate the program by pressing Alt+Space and a simple command bar appears. Start typing a file name and Wox uses an Everything-powered search system to find and display any matches. (Everything (32-bit) must be installed separately, but it's free and only takes a few moments.)
Once you see the file you need, double-click it or use the up/ down keys and enter to open it as normal.
You can locate commands or programs in much the same way. We typed Control Panel and saw entries for the standard Control Panel, Windows 10's version, and control panels for Java, our laptop's Intel HD graphics system, and more.
There's support for searching 20+ internet engines, including Google, Wikipedia, Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Github and more. Enter a shortcut for the search engine, plus a search term - g "windows launcher" to search Google - and a browser window opens with the results.
A calculator brings automatic support for simple math. Type 2*8/3, for instance, results appear as soon as you've entered a valid equation, and one click sends them to the clipboard.
Elsewhere, a Shell command launches console commands. A Folder option enables creating commands to open your favourite folders, a Colors tool previews hex colours, and there's more.
Wox can be extended further with more than 100 plugins. There are more search tools, currency convertors, a simple todo app, weather information, screenshot sharing and more.
What's new?
- website has been changed to wox.one
Verdict:
The Wox command bar is ugly and not very configurable. But there's plenty of features here, and a good set of plugins to add more, so overall it's well worth a closer look.
Your Comments & Opinion
The powerful search tool gains many new features
The powerful search tool gains many new features
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