Scott Hanselman's Computer Zen - Binding the SlickRun HotKey to Windows-R (and my silent quest for a 1970's style green screen console)

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Binding the SlickRun HotKey to Windows-R (and my silent quest for a 1970's style green screen console)

Posted 2006-04-17 02:37 PM in Musings.

Everyone knows that I loves me some SlickRun. I'm waiting for QuickSilver for Windows (although some feel that's already arrived as AppRocket - I'm not so sure).

I bind SlickRun (with large fonts) to my Windows-R key, but apparently it's not very obvious how to do this. ;)

Here's how: Edit your slickrun.ini in Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\SlickRun\SlickRun.ini and add/change "GrabWinR=1" in the [General] section as seen at right.

Sshot-1

I find the whole "Kermit Green on Black" large font color scheme very comforting.

Ldopa-1970-small

Aside: Does an app like the Mac's GLTerminal (originally written by James A. McCombe and some how leaked/escaped) exist for Windows? Does Chris Sells want to write this in Avalon? This would be a rocking sweet Avalon application that I'd happily download the WinFX library for. It could sweep the net. ;)

Maybe casey will take up the challenge, or perhaps I'll have to learn how to do it myself. Another idea would be to modify the console application from SourceForge.

Tracked by:
"Interesting Finds" (Jason Haley) [Trackback]
"Interesting Finds" (Jason Haley) [Trackback]
"Slickrun" (The Net Guru) [Trackback]
"New SlickRun Beta" (shahine.com/omar/) [Trackback]

Monday, April 17, 2006 3:57:56 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

casey will be at Deeper in .NET Saturday -- you can ask him there... :)

Scott Isaacs

Monday, April 17, 2006 10:29:07 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

I actually use that color scheme for my command prompt. I don't see why you need a separate application for that.
Just go to Start > Run: cmd
Click the top-left icon, and choose Properties.

Tommy Carlier

Monday, April 17, 2006 10:32:29 PM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Tommy...it's not the color change, it's the warped and old-style CRT Fonts...

Scott Hanselman

Tuesday, April 18, 2006 8:55:21 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

I've been using SlickRun since I first "discovered" it on your list of apps. Great find BTW.

As for the console, I'm a g-o-b fan as well. I've been using Console (http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/console/Console2_demo_015.zip?download) for a while now and thought I'd pass it along. It allows for tabbed consoles, customized fonts (not just 2!)/colors, transparency, z-order & docking, and even let's you select the hotkeys for copy/paste. All in all, quite an upgrade from the standard.

Dave O'Hara

Tuesday, April 18, 2006 9:44:34 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Slickrun rocks. Hands down.

Approcket, imho, is not there yet. Too much memory use, too many drop-down options at times (I like Slickrun PRECISELY because it eliminates ambiguities).

If Approcket has Slickrun interface capabilities and it has Windows Desktop Search functionality, then I'll bite.

But then again, Slickrun + Windows Desktop Search totally rocks. Thanks so much Scott for the tools page. I felt such a noob reflecting on how I USED to get things done.

My only complaint to date is that Slickrun doesn't recall Firefox web history.

Eric Lau

Tuesday, April 18, 2006 9:57:30 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Doh! I just found out the latest beta version of Slickrun is fully compatible with Firefox. Woot!

Eric Lau

Thursday, April 20, 2006 7:00:56 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Hey scott - that didnt work for me man? the slickrun binding to win + r

Scott

Thursday, April 20, 2006 7:03:01 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

I exactly did this - Here's how: Edit your slickrun.ini in Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\SlickRun\SlickRun.ini and add/change "GrabWinR=1" in the [General] section as seen at right.

Scott

Thursday, April 20, 2006 7:32:47 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Thanks for looking out for me, Scott. Felt like a rock star (or at least a groupie) seeing your blog on my referral list.

It wasn't clear from my post but I did eventually work out the whole Win+R key thing by the time I posted (although I think I had to shut SlickRun down to have the .ini file appear initially). The "How?" had to do with how SlickRun was able to bind to the Win+R key when all my searching seemed to indicate that this was not possible.

Kyle

Thursday, April 20, 2006 7:44:49 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Other Scott - did you restart Slickrun?

Scott Hanselman

Thursday, April 20, 2006 9:19:46 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Scott ...That Fixed it ... I promise i did restart it before, but slickrun rewrote the entry in the ini file, on exiting. So this time i exited it before changing the ini file.

Thanks

Scott

Thursday, April 20, 2006 9:26:27 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Scott ... i was wondering - it would be AWESOME to see you on DNR TV or something. I saw about 10 minutes of you on that grok talk - and that made me 10 times more productive than i was before. I mean if i had money i would pay to see you work. I have picked up about 10-15 tools from your list - and already i am pretty popular. If i could see a video of your working or something i would not have any problems finding a date for saturday nights. Or maybe you can have a membership based - streaming of your work day ? I would definitely be interested...

Scott

Sunday, April 23, 2006 9:02:40 AM (Pacific Standard Time, UTC-08:00)

Dude, you want me to build a crappy console for you? Why not just hit your monitor with a hammer and call it a job well done? : )