Tools for Windows

Fri, Jan 6, 2023

This is a running collection of tools I use to make Windows good.

AutoHotkey + SharpKeys

→ See Many but finite’s ‘Home Row Computing’

Allows me to type arrow keys, backspace, Delete, Home, End, etc without having to move my hands away from the ‘home row’ of the keyboard (asdf, jkl;)
I.e. like vim; but available in any text field in any app.

In general, AutoHotkey enables end-user programming of the Windows GUI, through a (slightly quirky) scripting language.

The functionality of many of the apps below can be implemented with AutoHotkey instead; but dedicated config GUIs (plus collaborative open-source dev) makes the apps worth it.

WinCompose

→ Keyboard shortcuts for special characters (Greek letters, math symbols, arrows, accents, ..)

→ See my .XCompose file

• tray app, C#, active development
• Kinda wonky UI, but works
• Supports the .XCompose file format from the linux world.
• The big advantage over e.g. Julia’s great \alpha<tab>-completion (see also the first “Julia likes” slide here): this is available in every text field in every app.

Beeftext

→ Text snippets (auto-replace shortcodes with oft-typed text)

• tray app, C++, modern GUI (Qt5), active development
• Great UX

What I use it for (i.e. things I’m tired of typing over and over):

• To make images less huge on github: <img width=400 src="…">

PasteIntoFile

→ Paste images on the clipboard directly as files in Windows Explorer (without having to go through Paint)

• tray app, C#, active development
• Long history. eltos’s fork (the one linked here) is the most advanced version.

PowerPoint is one of the best tools for vector graphic design, weirdly/sadly. To use diagrams made in PPT in LaTeX, I copy a diagram from PPT and paste it as an svg files using this great tool.

ExplorerPatcher

→ Get the old taskbar & context menu back in Windows 11

• C, active development
• accessed by right-clicking taskbar > ‘Properties’

Microsoft-supported tools

All are open-source and under active development.

• Microsoft PowerToys
• Windows Terminal
• WSL 2
  • More and more dev tools have a good UX on Windows. But for a lot of them, Windows development is still painful, even if they nominally/technically support it. WSL, especially in combination with VS Code remote dev, is a good solution then.
• VS Code
• Do not use: PowerAutomate (bad UX).