On a Mac, opening the launcher means pressing cmd-space at any time, getting a popup text entry field, typing "1+2", seeing the answer, and hitting esc to dismiss it. That's the entire workflow for operating a calculator, launching an app, searching Google, locating a file, or whatever. I challenge you to do that operation with a separate app more (or even as) efficiently.

There are good tools for doing each of those things separately. A good launcher that allows you to do any of them with such trivial overhead is a huge time saver.

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throwawayffffas a day ago | parent [-]

The way I do it is, I type python in a new terminal, the terminal emulator is running at all times.

So, its ctrl-s + c, python, enter, 1 + 2, enter.

Slightly more work but meh.

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rafram 19 hours ago | parent [-]

Sure, but what does Python return if you type in "$100 in EUR" or "10 pounds in kg"?

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throwawayffffas 18 hours ago | parent [-]

That's what your browser is for.

My main problem with that kind of launcher is that if I write "gimp" on my launcher there is only one correct answer, launching gimp. Everything else is just noise.

The choice to offer all that other functionality detracts from the main one.

	▲	kstrauser 16 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Launchers compete on their smartness. One that didn’t show Gimp as the top result wouldn’t have users very long. You can also turn off the results you don’t like.