Quick Cliq is a free, small app that provides instant access to program, folders, files, and URLs.
Created by the same developers that brought us previously mentioned JumpTo, Quick Cliq offers a slew of additional functions, including “folder menu” shortcuts that automatically display all sub folders recursively in cascading menus.
Quick Cliq also includes a unique clipboard management component (unique because it only captures text via special hotkeys, rather than the contents of the Windows clipboard), a “Memo” function which provides quick access to notes or bits of text and can insert them into applications (as for example frequently used email signatures), and a function whereby you can quickly hide and retrieve open windows right from the Quick Cliq interface Moroever, any functions that you might not want can be simply disabled.
Here’s a top 10 list of features I like about this program (in ascending order):
1. The folder menu shortcuts / S-Menu feature: I like this alot. You may have seen this before in programs such as MenuApp but to have it incorporated in an on-demand launcher like this is very cool.
The so called S-Menu feature creates a shortcut that can launch the recursive cascading menu from the desktop, similar to what MenuApp does. To create this, go to the add/change dialog and right click “Create S-Menu” on a folder menu item. Note that this didn’t work for me on my 64bit Windows 7 machine, but hopefully that will be fixed in future versions.
2. It’s small: despite its many functions, Quick Cliq consumed less than 10 megs of memory on my 64 bit Windows 7 machine (with slight variability around that up and down).
3. The context menu entry: Quick Cliq supports a context menu entry that makes it easy to simply right click on an icon to add that element to the launcher. Super cool, because adding items to a launcher really should not be a lot of work.
Note: the context menu entry can be enabled in the settings, and worked perfectly on my 64bit OS.
4. The clipboard manager: multiplies the windows clipboard 9 times and provide some useful features including the ability to edit or append text to a clipboard. It’s quite different from your typical clipboard managers such as ArsClip and Ditto in that it does not automatically connect to the Windows Clipboard, but is invoked via its own unique keyboard shortcuts (CTRL+1-9 to store clips, Alt+1-9 to paste, and CTRL+Win+1-9 to append to existing text).
I personally like this because in my job I handle masses of data via the clipboard and invariably get into memory glitches and crashes with the clipboard managers mentioned above trying to capture and store everything I clip, and hence I appreciate that Quick Cliq’s clipboard manager is separate from the default Windows clipboard.
5. The mouse gestures: Quick Cliq’s various functions can be launched via mouse gestures (right click then move in any of the 4 directions). I’m not a big fan of mouse gestures in general, but was surprised with just how practical these turned out to be.
6. Memos: these can be used as notes, but are designed as “permanent” clipboard items, such as your email signature or bits of code or text that you might use frequently. You can either copy these into the clipboard or otherwise insert them straight into the application you are using.
7. Customizable hotkeys: the default hotkey (Win+Z) can be changed, as can all hotkeys and mouse gestures. Which is great especially if a hotkey conflicts with another application
8. You can pick and choose which functions you want and don’t want: from the settings, if you do not care for one function or another you can simply disable it in the settings (say, for example, you are quire happy with the clipboard manager you already have and don’t want to add another one, etc.)
9. Cutsomizable look and feel: another improvement over JumpTo is that Quick Cliq supports icon display for shortcuts and folders. But that’s not all: Icons, menu sizes, colors, background colors, etc, are customizable. Moreover, it offers several display sizes, and you can make your menu itself larger or smaller. It will let you add submenus and separators, and format the text style (e.g. bold), change the color or background color of entries etc.
10. It’s portable: unzip and run.
Wish list (or how this program can be even better)
- Switching to favorite folders inside the Windows open/save dialog: is not provided (unlike “FolderMenu“, a similar app which is built using the same AutoHotkey script as Quick Cliq, and which provides this).
- Clip/Memo preview on hover: it is somewhat difficult to know which clip or memo is which, as the only way to see the contents is select “view” for each single entry. It would be great if some of the actual text is displayed in the menu, and/or if you could simply hover over the entry and get a preview tooltip.
The verdict: I’ve used this extensively for 24 hours, and I can say that it is an excellent launcher, and easily one of the best of its kind. The developers have built this with great attention to detail, and the set of functions it offers actually makes sense, and do NOT feel like overkill (the fact that any of the functions is optional and can be easily disabled is a plus). Although I do feel strongly that it could have been served greatly by the option to invoke favorite folder in the Windows open/save dialog.
Note: this software is built using AutoHotkey script which sometimes turns up as a (false) positive in some antivirus software. It is not malware; and here is the VirusTotal profile that proves it.
Lastley, there are 2 video tutorials offered on the Quick Cliq site; make sure to check out the “Extra Functions Tutorial” that can quickly get you up to speed with some of the more interesting things that it does.
Version Tested: 1.0.0.1
Compatibility: Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7.
Go to the program home page to download the latest version (approx 844K).
