Over a decade ago, I wrote something similar (but not as advanced) that I still run on any Windows machine I use - <a href="http://chime.tv/products/hotchime.shtml" rel="nofollow">http://chime.tv/products/hotchime.shtml</a><p>When I switched over to a Mac as my primary machine 4 years ago (Jan 2010), I tried Quicksilver, which was the closest replacement to my app. It was ok but never really felt as snappy as my Windows app. After a few months of trying to make Quicksilver work, I was on the verge of porting my app to OSX when I came across the newly launched Alfred.<p>I have been a very satisfied user ever since. The moment a family/friend of mine gets a Mac, the first thing I tell them is to install Alfred. I'm so glad the Pepperrells built Alfred. They saved me a lot of time I would have spent (1) porting over my app to OSX (2) manually launching apps in the meantime.